Page:Neith Boyce--The bond.djvu/307

Rh habit and experience hold you to it. But re- member, she never belonged to me. She was only a wonderful possibility."

They were in the depths of the fir-wood now, climbing steeply. Teresa paused for breath, and sat down, panting a little, on a log by the roadside. The stream hummed far below, invisible. Crayven lit a cigarette, first offering Teresa one, and stood leaning against a tree beside her.

"You were twenty-six then," she said, looking off into the forest.

"Yes, I was a boy. It was the time to love—I needed it, and"

"Have you a picture of her?" asked Teresa, after a moment.

"Not here. I don't carry it next my heart."

"Was she unkind to you?"

"I didn't want her to be kind. I wanted her." "I can't understand why you didn't get her. You seem to me the sort"

"Women didn't like me then. I was too eager. I've observed that they like me better now—because I don't want anything much of them, I suppose."

"And you never have—since?"

He was silent, till she looked up at him and met his eyes.

"Not in the same way," he said. He moved abruptly, and sat down on the log beside her. "Not with the same belief and hope. That was