"It sounds all right to me," said Scott. And he walked away thoughtfully, fists dug deep in his pockets.
And one still, sunny afternoon, standing alone on the dry granite crags of the Golden Dome, he looked up and saw, a quarter of a million miles above him, the moon's ghost swimming in azure splendour. Then he looked down and saw the map of the earth below him, where his forests spread out like moss, and his lakes mirrored the clouds, and a river belonging to him traced its course across the valley in a single silver thread. And a slight blush stung his face at the thought that, without any merit or endeavour of his own, his money had bought it all--his money, that had always acted as his deputy, fought for him, conquered for him, spoken for him, vouched for him--perhaps pleaded for him!--he shivered, and suddenly he realised that this golden voice was, in fact, all there was to him.
What had he to identify him on earth among mankind? Only his money. Wherein did he differ from other men? He had more money. What had he to offer as excuse for living at all? Money. What had he done? Lived on it, by it. Why, then, it was the money that was entitled to distinction, and he figured only as its parasite! Then he was nothing--even a little less. In the world there was man and there was money. It seemed that he was a little lower in the scale than either; a parasite--scarcely a thing of distinction to offer Kathleen Severn.
It was the day following his somewhat disordered and impassioned declaration. He expected to receive his answer that evening; and he descended the mountain in a curiously uncertain and perplexed state of mind which at times bordered on a modesty painfully akin to humbleness.
Meanwhile, Duane was preparing to depart on the morrow. And that evening he also was to have his definite answer to the letter which Kathleen had taken to Geraldine Seagrave that morning.
"Dear," he had written, "I once told you that my weakness needed the aid of all that is best in you; that yours required the best of courage and devotion that lies in me. It is surely so. Together we conquer the world--which is ourselves.
"For the little things that seem to threaten our separation do not really alarm me. Even if I actually committed the inconsequential and casual thing that so abruptly and so deeply offended you, there remains enough soundness in me at the core to warrant your charity and repay, in a measure, your forgiveness and a renewal of your interest in my behalf.