Page:Adams - Essays in Modernity.djvu/64

52 aristocrat schoolboy from the very moment when he first saw him—that something, too, of the picturesque and oriental element in the habitually calm, yet intensely resolute nature of the swarthy Northerner;—it was singular how at this moment 'the full flood-tide' (as he had said) of all these memories, the sweet and sane physical magnetism, with its spiritual counterpart of serene and perfect sincerity, touched with passion and mystery, caught and overwhelmed him, making him, despite himself, love and believe in his friend once more.

A minute later they were seated side by side on the faded and torturous sofa, talking like two schoolboys, Daniel's arm resting lightly on the other's shoulder.

'Now, Gerald,' he said, 'I want you to come right off with me. We will get down home in time for dinner, and then we will talk up in a starry turret till the dawn breaks, just as we used to do, and tell one another everything we have been doing and thinking and suffering all these seven years.'

After a short struggle with an already more than half-hearted reluctance, Daniel had his wish; led him down to the open carriage that was waiting at the door; put him into it; got in himself, and they drove off rapidly together.

'We have time,' said he, 'to drive all the way.