Page:Middle Aged Love Stories (IA middleagedlove00bacorich).djvu/181

 never ceased, that hopeful, hopeless yearning? She had never left her home or country; she knew only the happy dream of one day seeing another, not her own, fair, strange, and distant; she was homesick for new lands. Did he feel what she felt—did he feel perhaps more? Her heart cried out that this could not be, but she hushed it, and saw him growing slowly old, old, waiting for the lurking death—how soon would it come? a year, a month?—dreaming of France and youth, waking to the dull reality; sitting alone in a strange, cheap boarding-house, while she went gayly from land to land.

"Vous me dites 'au revoir,' mademoiselle—moi, je vous dis 'adieu.' "

She knew little French, but she understood that, and as that harsh sob rang in her ears again, as she saw that bent figure, that hopeless face, she knew in one quick, far-seeing flash of bereavement that it was over, that she could bear her