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were concerned. Anne felt an unreasonable resentment against Miss Cornelia. Then she gave a little inward groan. No matter who was to blame the mischief was done. And Leslieā€”what of Leslie? It was for Leslie Anne felt most concerned.

ā€œDoes Leslie know this, Mr. Ford?ā€ she asked quietly.

ā€œNoā€”no,ā€”unless she has guessed it. You surely donā€™t think Iā€™d be cad and scoundrel enough to tell her, Mrs. Blythe. I couldnā€™t help loving herā€”thatā€™s allā€”and my misery is greater than I can bear.ā€

ā€œDoes SHE care?ā€ asked Anne. The moment the question crossed her lips she felt that she should not have asked it. Owen Ford answered it with overeager protest.

ā€œNoā€”no, of course not. But I could make her care if she were freeā€”I know I could.ā€

ā€œShe does careā€”and he knows it,ā€ thought Anne. Aloud she said, sympathetically but decidedly:

ā€œBut she is not free, Mr. Ford. And the only thing you can do is to go away in silence and leave her to her own life.ā€

ā€œI knowā€”I know,ā€ groaned Owen. He sat down on the grassy bank and stared moodily into the amber water beneath him. ā€œI know thereā€™s nothing to doā€”nothing but to say conventionally, `Good-bye, Mrs. Moore. Thank you for all your kindness to me this summer,ā€™ just as I would have said it to the sonsy, bustling, keen-eyed housewife I expected her to be when I came. Then Iā€™ll pay my board money like any honest boarder and go! Oh, itā€™s very simple. No doubtā€”no perplexityā€”a straight road to the end of the world!

And Iā€™ll walk itā€”you neednā€™t fear that I wonā€™t, Mrs. Blythe. But it would be easier to walk over red-hot ploughshares.ā€

Anne flinched with the pain of his voice. And there was so little she could say that would be adequate to the situation. Blame was out of the questionā€”advice was not neededā€”sympathy was mocked by the manā€™s stark agony. She could only feel with him in a maze of compassion and regret. Her heart ached for Leslie! Had not that poor girl suffered enough without this?

ā€œIt wouldnā€™t be so hard to go and leave her if she were only happy,ā€ resumed Owen passionately. ā€œBut to think of her living deathā€”to realise what it is to which I do leave her! THAT is the worst of all. I would give my life to make her happyā€”and I can do nothing even to help herā€”nothing. She is bound forever to that poor wretchā€”with nothing to look forward to but growing old in a succession of empty, meaningless, barren years. It drives me mad to think of it. But I must go through my life, never seeing her, but always knowing what she is enduring. Itā€™s hideousā€”hideous!ā€

ā€œIt is very hard,ā€ said Anne sorrowfully. ā€œWeā€”her friends hereā€”all know how hard it is for her.ā€

ā€œAnd she is so richly fitted for life,ā€ said Owen rebelliously.

ā€œHer beauty is the least of her dowerā€”and she is the most beautiful woman Iā€™ve ever known. That laugh of hers! Iā€™ve angled all summer to evoke that laugh, just for the delight of hearing it. And her eyesā€” they are as deep and blue as the gulf out there. I never saw such bluenessā€”and gold! Did you ever see her hair down, Mrs. Blythe?ā€

ā€œNo.ā€

ā€œI didā€”once. I had gone down to the Point to go fishing with Captain Jim but it was too rough to go out, so I came back. She had taken the opportunity of what she expected to be an afternoon alone to wash her hair, and she was standing on the veranda in the sunshine to dry it. It fell all about her to her feet in a fountain of living gold. When she saw me she hurried in, and the wind caught her hair and swirled it all around herā€”Danae in her cloud. Somehow, just then the knowledge that I loved her came home to meā€”and realised that I had loved her from the moment I first saw her standing against the darkness in that glow of light. And she must live on hereā€”petting and soothing Dick, pinching and saving for a mere existence, while I spend my life longing vainly for her, and debarred, by that very fact, from even giving her the little help a friend might. I walked the shore last night, almost till dawn, and thrashed it all out over and over again. And yet, in spite of everything, I canā€™t find it in my heart to be sorry that I came to Four Winds. It seems to me that, bad as everything is, it would be still worse never to have known Leslie. Itā€™s burning, searing pain to love her and leave herā€”but not to have loved her is unthinkable. I suppose all this sounds very crazyā€”all these terrible emotions always do sound foolish when we put them into our inadequate words. They are not meant to be spokenā€”only felt and endured. I shouldnā€™t have spokenā€”but it has helpedā€” some. At least, it has given me strength to go away respectably tomorrow morning, without making a scene. Youā€™ll write me now and then, wonā€™t you, Mrs. Blythe, and give me what news there is to give of her?ā€

ā€œYes,ā€ said Anne. ā€œOh, Iā€™m so sorry you are goingā€”weā€™ll miss you soā€”weā€™ve all been such friends! If it were not for this you could come back other summers. Perhaps, even yetā€”by-and-byā€”when youā€™ve forgotten, perhapsā€”ā€

ā€œI shall never forgetā€”and I shall never come back to Four Winds,ā€ said Owen briefly.

Silence and twilight fell over the garden. Far away the sea was lapping gently and monotonously on the bar. The wind of evening in the poplars sounded like some sad, weird, old runeā€”some broken dream of old memories. A slender shapely young aspen rose up before them against the fine maize and emerald and paling rose of the western sky, which brought out every leaf and twig in dark, tremulous, elfin loveliness.

ā€œIsnā€™t that beautiful?ā€ said Owen, pointing to it with the air of a man who puts a certain conversation behind him.

ā€œItā€™s so beautiful that it hurts me,ā€ said Anne softly. ā€œPerfect things like that always did hurt meā€”I remember I called it `the queer acheā€™ when I was a child. What is the reason that pain like this seems inseparable from perfection? Is it the pain of finalityā€”when we realise that there can be nothing beyond but retrogression?ā€

ā€œPerhaps,ā€ said Owen dreamily, ā€œit is the prisoned infinite in us calling out to its kindred infinite as expressed in that visible perfection.ā€

ā€œYou seem to have a cold in the head. Better rub some tallow on your nose when you go to bed,ā€ said Miss Cornelia, who had come in through the little gate between the firs in time to catch Owenā€™s last remark. Miss Cornelia liked Owen; but it was a matter of principle with her to visit any ā€œhighfalutinā€ language from a man with a snub.

Miss Cornelia personated the comedy that ever peeps around the corner at the tragedy of life. Anne, whose nerves had been rather strained, laughed hysterically, and even Owen smiled. Certainly, sentiment and passion had a way of shrinking out of sight in Miss Corneliaā€™s presence. And yet to Anne nothing seemed quite as hopeless and dark and painful as it had seemed a few moments before. But sleep was far from her eyes that night.

CHAPTER 27 ON THE SAND BAR

Owen Ford left Four Winds the next morning. In the evening Anne went over to see Leslie, but found nobody. The house was locked and there was no light in any window. It looked like a home left soulless. Leslie did not run over on the following dayā€”which Anne thought a bad sign.

Gilbert having occasion to go in the evening to the fishing cove, Anne drove with him to the Point, intending to stay awhile with Captain Jim. But the great light, cutting its swathes through the fog of the autumn evening, was in care of Alec Boyd and Captain Jim was away.

ā€œWhat will you do?ā€ asked Gilbert. ā€œCome with me?ā€

ā€œI donā€™t want to go to the coveā€”but Iā€™ll go over the channel with you, and roam about on the sand shore till you come back. The rock shore is too slippery and grim tonight.ā€

Alone on the sands of the bar Anne gave herself up to the eerie charm of the night. It was warm for September, and the late afternoon had been very foggy; but a full moon had in part lessened the fog and transformed the harbor and the gulf and the surrounding shores into a strange, fantastic, unreal world of pale silver mist, through which everything loomed phantom-like. Captain Josiah Crawfordā€™s black schooner sailing down the channel, laden with potatoes for Bluenose ports, was a spectral ship bound for a far uncharted land, ever receding, never to be reached. The calls of unseen gulls overhead were the cries of the souls of doomed seamen. The little curls of foam that blew across the sand were elfin things stealing up from the sea-caves. The big, round-shouldered sand-dunes were the sleeping giants of some old northern tale. The lights that glimmered palely across the harbor were the delusive beacons on some coast of fairyland. Anne pleased herself with a hundred fancies as she wandered through the mist. It was delightfulā€”romanticā€” mysterious to be roaming here alone on this enchanted shore.

But was she alone? Something loomed in the mist before herā€”took shape and formā€”suddenly moved towards her across the wave-rippled sand.

ā€œLeslie!ā€ exclaimed Anne in amazement. ā€œWhatever are you doingā€”HEREā€”tonight?ā€

ā€œIf it comes to that, whatever are YOU doing here?ā€ said Leslie, trying to laugh. The effort was a failure. She looked very pale and tired; but the love locks under her scarlet cap were curling about her face and eyes like little sparkling rings of gold.

ā€œIā€™m waiting for Gilbertā€”heā€™s over at the Cove. I intended to stay at the light, but Captain Jim is away.ā€

ā€œWell, I came here because I wanted to walkā€”and walkā€”and WALK,ā€ said Leslie restlessly. ā€œI couldnā€™t on the rock shoreā€”the tide was too high and the rocks prisoned me. I had to come hereā€”or I should have gone mad, I think. I rowed myself over the channel in Captain Jimā€™s flat. Iā€™ve been here for an hour. Comeā€”comeā€”let us walk. I canā€™t stand still. Oh, Anne!ā€

ā€œLeslie, dearest, what is the trouble?ā€ asked Anne, though she knew too well already.

ā€œI canā€™t tell youā€”donā€™t ask me . I wouldnā€™t mind your knowingā€” I wish you did knowā€”but I canā€™t tell youā€”I canā€™t tell anyone. Iā€™ve been such a fool, Anneā€”and oh, it hurts so terribly to be a fool. Thereā€™s nothing so painful in the world.ā€

She laughed bitterly. Anne slipped her arm around her.

ā€œLeslie, is it that you have learned to care for Mr. Ford?ā€

Leslie turned herself about passionately.

ā€œHow did you know?ā€ she cried. ā€œAnne, how did you know? Oh, is it written in my face for everyone to see? Is it as plain as that?ā€

ā€œNo, no. Iā€”I canā€™t tell you how I knew. It just came into my mind, somehow. Leslie, donā€™t look at me like that!ā€

ā€œDo you despise me?ā€ demanded Leslie in a fierce, low tone. ā€œDo you think Iā€™m wickedā€”unwomanly? Or do you think Iā€™m just plain fool?ā€

ā€œI donā€™t think you any of those things. Come, dear, letā€™s just talk it over sensibly, as we might talk over any other of the great crises of life. Youā€™ve been brooding over it and let yourself drift into a morbid view of it. You know you have a little tendency to do that about everything that goes wrong, and you promised me that you would fight against it.ā€

ā€œButā€”oh, itā€™s soā€”so shameful,ā€ murmured Leslie. ā€œTo love himā€”unsoughtā€”and when Iā€™m not free to love anybody.ā€

ā€œThereā€™s nothing shameful about it. But Iā€™m

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