As she approached the fountain where she had first met Stephen, it seemed to her that a romantic light, a visionary enchantment, fell over this one spot of ground, and divided it by some magic circle from every other place in the world.  The crude iron railing, the bare gravel, the ugly spouting fountain which was stripped of every leaf or blade of grass—­these things appeared to her through an indescribable glamour, as if they stood there as the visible gateway to some invisible garden of dreams.  Whenever she looked at this ordinary spot of earth a breathless realization of the wonder and delight of life rushed over her.  She knew nothing of the mental processes by which these external objects were associated with the deepest emotions of the heart.  Only when she visited this place that wave of happiness swept over her; and she lived again as vividly as she lived in the moments when Stephen was with her and she was looking into his eyes.

His voice called her while she stood there; and turning quickly, she saw that he was coming toward her down the walk.  Immediately the loungers on the benches vanished by magic; the murmur of the fountain became like the music of harps; and the sunshine on the grassy hill was alive with the quiver of wings.  As she went toward him she was aware of the blue sky, of the golden green of the trees, of the happy sounds of the birds, and over all, as if it were outside of herself, of the rapturous beating of her own heart.

“I was looking for you,” he said when he reached her.

“And you found me at last.”  Her eyes were like wells of joy.

“I’d never have given up until I found you.”  The words were trivial; but it was the things he said without words that really mattered.  Already they had established a communion that was independent of speech.  He had never told her that he loved her; yet she saw it in every glance of his eyes and heard it in every tone of his voice.

While they walked slowly up the hill she wondered trustingly why, when he had told her so plainly in every other way that he loved her, he should never have put it into words.  There could not be any doubt of it; perhaps this was the reason he hesitated.  The present was so perfect that it was like the most exquisite hour of a spring afternoon.  One longed to hold it back even though one knew that it led to something more lovely still.

“Are you happy?” she asked, and wondered if he would kiss her again when they parted as he had kissed her yesterday in the dusk of the hall?

“Yes, and no.”  He drew nearer to her.  “I am happy now like this—­here with you—­but at other times I am troubled.  I can’t see my way clearly.”

“But why should you?  Why should any one be troubled when it is so easy to be happy?”

“Easy?” He laughed.  “If life were only as simple as that!”

“It is if one knows what one wants.”

“Well, one may know what one wants, and yet not know if one is wise in wanting it.”