ng," she explained in a voice that was thin
with misery and confusion. "I got his message last night, but I didn't
tell you because I knew it would spoil our last time together, and I was
afraid you would do something foolish.{~HORIZONTAL ELLIPSIS~} Please say you're not angry. You
know there was nothing for it. We couldn't have done any of those wild
things you talked about. I'll always love you, honestly I will. Won't you
even say goodby?{~HORIZONTAL ELLIPSIS~}"

He at last did say goodby and hung up the receiver and went across the
room and sat in an armchair. It suddenly struck him that he was very
tired. He had not realized it before {~HORIZONTAL ELLIPSIS~} how tired he was. There was none of
the mad rebellion in him now that had filled him when first she had run
away from him. Although he had never acknowledged it to himself he had
been more than half prepared for this. He had told himself that he was
going to do something bold and decisive, but he had procrastinated; he had
never really formed a plan.

Weariness was his leading emotion. He was spent, physically and
emotionally. He wanted her almost as much as ever. While she was no longer
the remote and dazzling star she had been, the bond of flesh that had been
created between them seemed a stronger, a more constant thing than
blinding unsatisfied desire. But a great despair possessed him. There was
so obviously nothing he could do. Just as his other disappointment had
given him his first stinging impression of the irony of life, that
cunningly builds a hope and then smashes it; so now he felt for the first
time something of the helplessness of man in the current or his destiny,
driven by deep-laid desires he seldom understands, and ruled by chances he
can never calculate. From love a man learns life in quick and painful
flashes.

Through the open window came the din of the New York street--purr and throb
of innumerable engines, rumble and clatter of iron wheels, tapping of
thousands of restless feet, making a blended current of sound upon which
floated and tossed the shrillness of police whistles and newsboys' voices
and auto horns. It had been the background of his life during memorable
days. Once it had stirred his pulses, seeming a wild accompaniment to the
song of his passion. Now it wearied him inexpressibly; it seemed to be
hammering in his ears; he wanted to get away from it. He would go home
that day.

As always on his trips across the continent