Page:Willa Cather - The Song of the Lark.djvu/341

 before you changed your mind. You are not a sentimental person."

Thea drew her veil down over her face., "I think I am, a little; about you," she said quietly. Fred's irony somehow hurt her.

"What 's at the bottom of your mind, Thea?" he asked hurriedly. "I can't tell. Why do you consider it at all, if you 're not sure? Why are you here with me now?"

Her face was half-averted. He was thinking that it looked older and more firm—almost hard—under a veil.

"Is n't it possible to do things without having any very clear reason?" she asked slowly. "I have no plan in the back of my mind. Now that I 'm with you, I want to be with you; that 's all. I can't settle down to being alone again. I am here to-day because I want to be with you to-day." She paused. "One thing, though; if I gave you my word, I 'd keep it. And you could hold me, though you don't seem to think so. Maybe I 'm not sentimental, but I 'm not very light, either. If I went off with you like this, it would n't be to amuse myself."

Ottenburg's eyes fell. His lips worked nervously for a moment. "Do you mean that you really care for me, Thea Kronborg?" he asked unsteadily.

"I guess so. It 's like anything else. It takes hold of you and you 've got to go through with it, even if you 're afraid. I was afraid to leave Moonstone, and afraid to leave Harsanyi. But I had to go through with it."

"And are you afraid now?" Fred asked slowly.

"Yes; more than I 've ever been. But I don't think I could go back. The past closes up behind one, somehow. One would rather have a new kind of misery. The old kind seems like death or unconsciousness. You can't force your life back into that mould again. No, one can't go back." She rose and stood by the back grating of the platform, her hand on the brass rail.

Fred went to her side. She pushed up her veil and turned