to fear she had
hurt him, what might have been a little cloud was pierced by sunshine.
"How ridiculously glad she is that I'm not a coward!" He, too, in spite
of annoyance, felt more hopeful than he had been for a long time.

At Genoa they got long delayed letters and papers. In one of these a
short paragraph announced the death of Madame Danterre. "It is
believed," were the concluding words, "that she has left her large
fortune to her daughter, Miss Mary Dexter." That was the first reminder
to Rose that the interlude of mere enjoyment was almost over. She was
not going to repine; it had been very good. Coming on board after
reading this with a quiet patient look, a look habitual to her during
the last two years, but which had faded under the sunshine of happy
days, Rose saw Edmund Grosse standing alone in the stern of the boat
with a number of letters in his left hand pressed against his leg,
looking fixedly at the water. The yacht was already standing out to sea,
but Edmund had not glanced a farewell at beautiful and yet prosperous
Genoa, a city that no modern materialism can degrade. Like a young bride
of the sea, she is decked by things old and things new, and her marble
palaces do not appear to be insulted by the jostling of modern commerce.
All things are kept fresh and pure on that wonderful coast. Something
had happened, of that Rose was sure; but what?

Edmund did not look puzzled; he was deciding no knotty question at this
moment. Nor did he look simply unhappy: she knew his expression when in
sorrow and when in physical pain or mere disgust. He looked intensely
preoccupied and very firm. Perhaps, she fancied, he too had a deep sense
of that passing of life, of something akin in the swift movement of the
water passing the yacht and the swift movement of life passing by the
individual man. Was he, perhaps, feeling how life was going for him and
for Rose, and by the simple fact of its passing on while they were
standing passive their lives would be fixed apart?--passing, apart from
what might have been of joy, of peace, of company along the road? There
are moments when, even without the stimulus of passion, human beings
have a sort of guess at the possibilities of helping one another, of
giving strength, and gaining sweetness, that are slipping by. There are
many degrees of regret, between that of ships that pass in the night,
and that of those who have voyaged long together. There are passages of
pleasure sym