Page:George Gibbs--Love of Monsieur.djvu/294

 rays like so many snakes of fire to mingle and play amid the glow of the caressing surges, which gushed languidly at their very feet.

To have spoken would have been to break the spell which bound them to the infinite. And so they sat enthroned in these wonderful dominions of which for the nonce they were prince and princess.

“Thou art content?” he asked at last.

She did not answer him at once. When she did, it was softly and with eyes which sought the distant horizon away from him.

“If to be content means to breathe freely, deeply, the pure air of heaven, to thank God for the present, to care not what evil has been or what evil may be, to be engulfed in quiet delight, to be swathed in peace, then, monsieur, I am content.”

He flushed warmly, and the arm about her tightened. He sought her lips with his own. She did not resist him. And so before the high, effulgent altar of God’s heaven, with the surges for choristers, the stars for candles, and the 282