The Woodlanders

"Well?"

"I kissed them," he rejoined, rather shamefacedly.

"But you had hardly ever seen me except in the dusk?"

"Never mind. I was young then, and I kissed them. I wondered how I

could make the most of my trouvaille, and decided that I would call at

your hotel with them that afternoon. It rained, and I waited till next

day. I called, and you were gone."

"Yes," answered she, with dry melancholy. "My mother, knowing my

disposition, said she had no wish for such a chit as me to go falling

in love with an impecunious student, and spirited me away to Baden. As

it is all over and past I'll tell you one thing: I should have sent you

a line passing warm had I known your name. That name I never knew till

my maid said, as you passed up the hotel stairs a month ago, 'There's

Dr. Fitzpiers.'"

"Good Heaven!" said Fitzpiers, musingly. "How the time comes back to

me! The evening, the morning, the dew, the spot. When I found that

you really were gone it was as if a cold iron had been passed down my

back. I went up to where you had stood when I last saw you--I flung

myself on the grass, and--being not much more than a boy--my eyes were

literally blinded with tears. Nameless, unknown to me as you were, I

couldn't forget your voice."

"For how long?"

"Oh--ever so long. Days and days."

"Days and days! ONLY days and days? Oh, the heart of a man! Days and

days!"

"But, my dear madam, I had not known you more than a day or two. It was

not a full-blown love--it was the merest bud--red, fresh, vivid, but

small. It was a colossal passion in posse, a giant in embryo. It

never matured."

"So much the better, perhaps."

"Perhaps. But see how powerless is the human will against

predestination. We were prevented meeting; we have met. One feature

of the case remains the same amid many changes. You are still rich,

and I am still poor. Better than that, you have (judging by your last

remark) outgrown the foolish, impulsive passions of your early

girl-hood. I have not outgrown mine."

"I beg your pardon," said she, with vibrations of strong feeling in her

words. "I have been placed in a position which hinders such

outgrowings. Besides, I don't believe that the genuine subjects of

emotion do outgrow them; I believe that the older such people get the

worse they are. Possibly at ninety or a hundred they may feel they are

cured; but a mere threescore and ten won't do it--at least for me."