It is difficult to retain the memory of the
conflicts, miseries, temptations and crimes of men's self-seeking
existence when one is alone with the charming serenity of the unconscious
nature. Breathing the dreamless peace around the picturesque cottage I
was approaching, it seemed to me that it must reign everywhere, over all
the globe of water and land and in the hearts of all the dwellers on this
earth.
Flora came down to the garden gate to meet me, no longer the perversely
tempting, sorrowful, wisp of white mist drifting in the complicated bad
dream of existence. Neither did she look like a forsaken elf. I
stammered out stupidly, "Again in the country, Miss . . . Mrs . . . " She
was very good, returned the pressure of my hand, but we were slightly
embarrassed. Then we laughed a little. Then we became grave.
I am no lover of day-breaks. You know how thin, equivocal, is the light
of the dawn. But she was now her true self, she was like a fine tranquil
afternoon--and not so very far advanced either. A woman not much over
thirty, with a dazzling complexion and a little colour, a lot of hair, a
smooth brow, a fine chin, and only the eyes of the Flora of the old days,
absolutely unchanged.
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