'Ah, what pitiful broken episodes many lives are!' said Stella softly. 'All that might have saved them is defeated--every touch leads to the catastrophe, and then silence and darkness--and the great play goes on just the same. And yet how good it is to be alive and see the sky and look at the roses!'
'Will you give me a rose before I go, Stella?'
'Well, those I love the very best are the white fairy roses, and the cruel east wind on the 26th scorched the last of them, buds and all. But I can give you a Gloire de Dijon.'
'And, Stella, would you mind giving me that book with the "Lady of the Lake" in, and----'
'And just write my name in it, Stella--and the date--and here's a little parcel. Don't open it till I'm gone. You know you said you liked opening parcels.'
'But, Ted, I should see what it is before I take it.'
'No, you can settle about that when I see you in Melbourne.'
Stella took the little square parcel, and looked at it doubtfully. 'It's not another Kooditcha shoe?'
They passed into the library, where Stella got the book, and wrote 'E. Ritchie, 28th Dec.,' on the fly-leaf. Then they stepped out into the garden, and got an unopened rose, fragrant and smiling red at the lips.
'I am sorry your mother and Alice are out--say good-bye to them for me, Stella--next time I meet them I hope--well, we shall see..... Now, Stella, give me your two hands, and say, "God bless you, Ted!"'
She gave him her hands, and he looked into her face so long and steadfastly that she suddenly crimsoned under his gaze, and said with a little pout:
'Ted, you mustn't be so solemn. One would think you were going to Central Australia, or whale-fishing to Greenland in very bad company.'
He bent and kissed her hands, and then hurried away without once looking behind.
Stella stood where he left her, till she heard the sound of his horse's hoofs ringing on the roadway as he passed up Barton Terrace. And then traces of contending emotions swept over her face.
'Poor old Ted! I believe he is in some trouble. What if his health is really affected? But I can't believe it. That is a way men have if the least thing is wrong--they take themselves as seriously as if they were stuffed llamas. Well, I'm almost sorry I wasn't more sympathetic .... only it is so dangerous.' And the thought of Ted trying to read sonnets for her sake overcame her with amusement. Yet this was soon followed by a feeling akin to self-reproach. In the old days she had read to him--talked to him of what interested her most--but for the last two or three years, when they met, her chief feeling was a wondering amusement that one who had learned to read at all should so completely escape all tincture of books. She had got into the habit of listening to him--of apprehending his point of view--almost avoiding any direct personal talk that might influence him or modify his mental habits. But was he so entirely beyond any intellectual sympathy--so far removed from kinship with matters that lay beyond the common grooves of common life? Why had she relinquished those ardent dreams of being a power for good in the lives of those to whom she was dear?