As he came down to breakfast the next
morning, he found Bertha sitting at the window,
engaged in hemming what appeared to be a
rough kitchen towel. She bent eagerly over
her work, and only a vivid flush upon her cheek
told him that she had noticed his coming. He
took a chair, seated himself opposite her, and
bade her "good-morning." She raised her head,
and showed him a sweet, troubled countenance,
which the early sunlight illumined with a high
spiritual beauty. It reminded him forcibly of
those pale, sweet-faced saints of Fra Angelico,
with whom the frail flesh seems ever on the
point of yielding to the ardent aspirations of
the spirit. And still, even in this moment he
could not prevent his eyes from observing that
one side of her forefinger was rough from sewing,
and that the whiteness of her arm, which
the loose sleeves displayed, contrasted strongly
with the browned and sun-burned complexion of
her hands.
After breakfast they again walked together
on the beach, and Ralph, having once formed
his resolution, now talked freely of the New
World--of his sphere of activity there; of his
friends and of his plans for the future; and she
listened to him with a mild, perplexed look in
her eyes, as if trying vainly to follow the flight
of his thoughts. And he wondered, with secret
dismay, whether she was still the same strong,
brave-hearted girl whom he had once accounted
almost bold; whether the life in this narrow
valley, amid a hundred petty and depressing
cares, had not cramped her spiritual growth,
and narrowed the sphere of her thought.
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