And I
wanted you to come. I guess I'd got it all planned out how we'd make up
for what we'd lost, and build up a new life. But so far as I go, I
guess I didn't lose by what I've lived through. I guess I gained
somethin' I'd sooner give up my life than even lose the memory of."
So absorbed was she in her own spiritual inheritance that she quite
forgot his pain. She gazed past him with an unseeing look; and striving
to meet and recall it, he faced the vision of their divided lives.
To-morrow Amelia would remember his loss and mourn over it with
maternal pangs; to-night she was oblivious of all but her own. Great
human experiences are costly things; they demand sacrifice, not only of
ourselves, but of those who are near us. The room was intolerable to
Laurie. He took his hat and coat, and hurried out. Amelia heard the
dragging door closed behind him. She realized, with the numbness born
of supreme emotion, that he was putting on his coat outside in the
cold; and she did not mind. The bells stirred, and went clanging away.
Then she drew a long breath, and bowed her head on her hands in an
acquiescence that was like prayer.
It seemed a long time to Amelia before she awoke again to temporal
things.
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