She glanced at him
momentarily when he took his place--he saw that her under lip was
capable of an extremely human and annoying expression--and returned to
her veiled scrutiny of the sliding banks.
An unfamiliar emotion stirred at Elim's heart; and in his painstaking
introspective manner he exposed it. He found a happiness that, at the
same time, was a pain; he found an actual catch in his throat that was
a nebulous desire; he found an utter loneliness together with the
conviction that this earth was a place of glorious possibilities of
affinity. Principally he was conscious of an urging of his entire being
toward the slight figure in black, staring with wide bereft eyes into
the gathering evening. On the other side of the mast, Indy was sleeping
with her head upon her breast. The feeling in Elim steadily increased
in poignancy--faint stars appearing above the indefinite foliage
pierced him with their beauty, the ashen-blue sky vibrated in a singing
chord, the river divided in whispering confidences on the bow of the
sloop.
Elim Meikeljohn debated the wisdom of a remark; his courage grew
immeasurably reckless.
"The wind and river are shoving us along together." Pronounced, the
sentence seemed appallingly compromising; he had meant that the wind
and river together, not--
She made no reply; one hand, he saw, stirred slightly.
Since he had not been blasted into nothingness, he continued:
"I'm glad the war's over.
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