"For Ever and Ever"
IN the cold grey dawn I sit up and look at the woman by my side. One soft little white hand peeps out from the dainty lace, and on one ringer is a gold ring. There is just such another upon my own finger; and these two rings bind us to one another for ever and ever. And I am tired already.
She moves in her sleep, and buries her face deeper in the heavy folds of the bed-clothes. The little hand is still out, and lies so near me (so temptingly near, as I should have thought only a little while ago) that I can trace the faint blue lines in it as I have done many a time before. But now . . . how horrible it all seems! She stirs again, and draws the hand into the lace so that it is almost hidden. How pretty she looks! . . . with her silky brown hair. Ah, why do I find it so difficult to think of her, even when she is before my eyes thus? Why do I never think of her when she is absent? Why do great masses of tumbling black hair come into my mind, while I watch this soft brown tangle on the pillow before me? I have tried to beat down these thoughts—but they will come . . . and how can I help myself?
Look at her neck—how white it is! And yet—and yet, why does a warm brown something continually haunt me? A living something which brings with it the sun, the sky, and the sea?
