Then suddenly his eyes narrowed, the beat of his heart quickened, he smiled slowly. He had once visited Ithaca in the spring, it was lovely with its thick shade, its waterfalls, its lake; he determined that he would see it again. Then he laughed. He would go if it was as homely as Chestnut Ridge, if the month was January! No one need know, no one would ever be the worse for it. He could be there by to-morrow evening and any one so industrious as Ellen could cut Saturday classes. Saturday and Sunday would be days to set against months of unhappiness. He said again that no one would be the worse for it.
Suddenly he laughed at himself for a fool. Why had he not gone before? Why not at Christmas-time? If the mere intention could bring about this lightness of heart, this heavenly clearness of vision, this certainty of purpose, this deep joy, why had he not had all these long ago? She was, he did not doubt, prettier than ever, but it was not her prettiness which he valued, it was her youth, her steadfastness, her devotion. He was certain that she loved him, he remembered with amusement his short-lived jealousy.
He speculated as he drove upon the rarity of human happiness. His father's life--how dull, how arduous, how ill-rewarded! Mayne's--how favorable from without, how hollow within! What undeserved calamity had visited Fetzer--foolish Fetzer to whom he had listened so obediently! What disappointment Levis had suffered! How little satisfaction he himself had had and with what high hope he had begun! But here was happiness within reach!
He noticed with sharpened observation as he drove north, those changes in the landscape with which he had been familiar in his youth; he would point them out sometime to Ellen. He drove rapidly and unweariedly, his depression passing, feeling that he understood the joy of the aviator. His route lay to the east of Chestnut Ridge, but he would see presently a country similar to that in which he had been born and had spent his youth.
He did not think of Hilda, sitting heavily by the shaded window; his thoughts leaped ahead. He drove on and on like one possessed.
"I could give her riches and ease and travel," he said to himself. "It wouldn't be an unfair exchange for youth." It may have been the gathering dusk, it may have been a springing breeze, but a cool wind seemed to blow across his very heart. To wait another five years or ten! He must have Ellen now.