Here they were who, without words or acts, had been to each other
what Adam and Eve were in the Garden, without furtiveness, and guiltless
of secret acts which poison Love. What restrained them was native,
childlike camaraderie, intense, unusual and strange. The world would call
them romancists, if they believed that this restraint could be. But there
was something more. With all their frank childlikeness, there was also a
shyness, a reserve, which would not have been, if either had ever eaten
of the Fruit of Understanding until they met each other for the first
time.
"Are you--are you hurt?" he asked, his voice calmer than his spirit, his
heart beating terribly hard. "I'm all right," she answered. "I fell soft.
You see, I'm very light."
"No bones broken? Are you sure?" he asked solicitously.
She sat erect, drawing away from his arms and the support of his knee.
"Don't you see my legs and arms are all right! Help me up, please," she
added, and stretched out a hand.
Then, all at once, she saw the horse lying near. Again she shivered, and
her hand was thrown out in a gesture of pain.
"Oh, see-see!" she cried. "His leg is broken." She loved animals far more
than human beings. There were good reasons for it. She had fared hard in
life at the hands of men and women, because the only ones with whom, in
her seclusion, she had had to do, had sacrificed her, all save one-the
man beside her.
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