From that moment the world was all changed for Edward. He was no longer what he had been, and the world was no longer what it had been. They parted--he held her hands; they gazed in each other's eyes. They were on the point of embracing each other again.
Charlotte entered with the Captain. Edward inwardly smiled at their excuses for having stayed out so long. Oh! how far too soon you have returned, he said to himself.
They sat down to supper. They talked about the people who had been there that day. Edward, full of love and ecstasy, spoke well of every one--always sparing, often approving. Charlotte, who was not altogether of his opinion, remarked this temper in him, and jested with him about it--he who had always the sharpest thing to say on departed visitors, was this evening so gentle and tolerant.
With fervor and heartfelt conviction, Edward cried, "One has only to love a single creature with all one's heart, and the whole world at once looks lovely!"
Ottilie dropped her eyes on the ground, and Charlotte looked straight before her.
The Captain took up the word, and said, "It is the same with deep feelings of respect and reverence: we first learn to recognize what there is that is to be valued in the world, when we find occasion to entertain such sentiments toward a particular object."
Charlotte made an excuse to retire early to her room where she could give herself up to thinking over what had passed in the course of the evening between herself and the Captain.
When Edward sprang on shore, and, pushing off the boat, had himself committed his wife and his friend to the uncertain element, Charlotte found herself face to face with the man on whose account she had been already secretly suffering so bitterly, sitting in the twilight before her, and sweeping along the boat with the sculls in easy motion. She felt a depth of sadness, very rare with her, weighing on her spirits. The undulating movement of the boat, the splash of the oars, the faint breeze playing over the watery mirror, the sighing of the reeds, the long flight of the birds, the fitful twinkling of the first stars--there was something spectral about it all in the universal stillness. She fancied her friend was bearing her away to set her on some far-off shore, and leave her there alone; strange emotions were passing through her, and she could not give way to them and weep.