The House of Mirth
of the mystery. It was true, then, that she had taken money from
Trenor; but true also, as the contents of the little desk declared,
that the obligation had been intolerable to her, and that at the
first opportunity she had freed herself from it, though the act
left her face to face with bare unmitigated poverty.
That was all he knew—all he could hope to unravel of the story.
The mute lips on the pillow refused him more than this—unless
indeed they had told him the rest in the kiss they had left upon
his forehead. Yes, he could now read into that farewell all that
his heart craved to find there; he could even draw from it courage
not to accuse himself for having failed to reach the height of his
opportunity.
He saw that all the conditions of life had conspired to keep them
apart; since his very detachment from the external influences which
swayed her had increased his spiritual fastidiousness, and made it
more difficult for him to live and love uncritically. But at least
he HAD loved her—had been willing to stake his future on his faith
in her—and if the moment had been fated to pass from them before
they could seize it, he saw now that, for both, it had been saved
whole out of the ruin of their lives.
It was this moment of love, this fleeting victory over themselves,
which had kept them from atrophy and extinction; which, in her, had
reached out to him in every struggle against the influence of her
surroundings, and in him, had kept alive the faith that now drew
him penitent and reconciled to her side.
He knelt by the bed and bent over her, draining their last moment
to its lees; and in the silence there passed between them the word
which made all clear.
THE END
=Transcriber’s Note=:
1. I have modernized this text by modernizing the contractions: do
n’t becomes don’t, etc.
2. I have retained the British spelling of words like favour and
colour.
3. I found and corrected one instance of the name “Gertie,” which I
changed to “Gerty” to be consistent with rest of the book.
Linda Ruoff