Anne had averted her eyes, caught in one of those inner crises where the faculties are almost suspended. She faltered out: "And after--when I come back next year, shall I find you like this?"
He paused so long before replying that she moved with uncontrollable excitement, and as she did so his eyes caught hers and held them.
The intensity of his gaze did not waver but he said, unsteadily, until his own excitement mastered him, "I have assured myself again and again that I never should dare to tell you that I loved you; that I was not fit to approach you; that I must let you go, and try to live with the memory of you. But now I remember nothing but that I love you. I can speak of what I have been, but I cannot recall it. I feel nothing but that I am a man in the restored vigour of youth in the presence of the woman I want. If love is egoistical then I am rampant this moment with egoism. If I could have the bliss of marrying you I never should return to the past even in thought. I am a poet no longer. I am nothing but a lover. I remember nothing, want nothing, but the perfection of human happiness I should find with you."
The words poured from his lips before he finished, and the trained monotony of his voice had gone to the winds. His face was violently flushed, his eyes flashing. "I dare!" he cried exultingly. "I dare! It would be heaven of a sort to have broken through those awful barriers even if you told me to go and never enter your presence again."
"I cannot do that! I cannot!" And then she flung her arms out from her deep womanly figure with a gesture expressive as much of maternal yearning as of youthful and irresistible passion. "I will stay with you forever," she said.