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And you couldn't stand
that, could you?"
She upbraided me gently for treating everything as a jest.
"It isn't that you want to get rid of me, Simon?" she asked tearfully,
but with an attempt at a smile.
I took both hands and looked into her eyes--they are brave, truthful
eyes--and through my heart shot a great pain. Till that moment I had not
realised what I was giving up. The pleasant paths of the world--I could
leave them behind with a shrug. Political ambition, power, I could
justly estimate their value and could let them pass into other hands
without regret. But here was the true, staunch woman, great of heart and
wise, a helper and a comrade, and, if I chose to throw off the jester
and become the lover in real earnest and sweep my hand across the
hidden chords, all that a woman can become towards the man she loves. I
realised this.
I realised that if she did not love me passionately now it was only
because I, in my foolishness, had willed it otherwise. For the first
time I longed to have her as my own; for the first time I rebelled.


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