“Is this the last word?” he said, half risen.
He saw them, and touched her arm. “Don’t, don’t!” he said gently. “I suppose you know what is best for _you_!” The accent fell on the last word sadly. He rose; she saw him, a dim bulk on the light window-square as he stooped to gather up bags and umbrella; saw him passing her. The door closed behind him.
Florence, with a shiver, relaxed from her tension, leaning back in her chair a little weakly. Her eyes closed. All the glitter she had shown them on the platform had fallen away from her; and thus, with shut eyes, her unlighted face showed exhaustion so deep that peace seemed the next thing to it. The noise of the train swam heavily in her head. She had no thoughts, only—as now and again she opened her eyes—a vague noticing of small things; and then at sight of green onion-fields wheeling past the window, a sad stab of memory. She shut her eyes, lest some other sight remind her too cruelly of what was left behind. She did not sleep. She was unconscious of time in her deep, complete lethargy of soul and brain. When she opened her eyes again the lights were swinging down the middle of the car, and through the windows she looked out over water, beautiful violet-blue in a softly gathering dark. The train was puffing slower, and now a glimmering succession of windows shut out the water.
The dark tunnel of the ferry-house encompassed her, but the memory of the purple flash of sea lingered with a vivid pleasure—more vivid that the glimpse had been so short—as she followed the rush out of the car door. The cool, soft wind on her face, the crowd tearing to and fro, roused her. The “overland” was just pulling out; a string of electric lights, white jackets jumping to the platforms, faces peering from the windows, it passed her. She felt a queer throb, a wish to be going with it somewhere, outward bound. What had she to hold her anywhere? But even with the thought the sense of poignant personal loss would not rise up before her. Her lethargy was lost, but her consciousness, no longer concentrated upon herself, was relaxed to a keener perception of her surroundings—of the high, dusky-vaulted ferry-house, echoing full of voices and footsteps; of the fitful play of light on the foam churning through the tall piles of the ferry-slip; of the crowd she moved among, streaming down the ferry gangway, a succession of faces glimmering past, each stamped with its headlong personal object. They were still spurred and ridden by it, while she.... The salt breath of the sea rushed up to meet her, with suggestion of the immensities of oceans.