He looked up once or twice to make sure that she was still by his side:
she sat there so quietly. At last he spoke in his usual gruff way.
"Have you exhausted all your eloquence in your oration about learned
women?" he asked.
"No, I am reserving it for a better audience," she answered, trying to
be bright. But she was not bright.
"I believe you came out to the country to day to seek for cheerfulness,"
he said after a pause. "Have you found it?"
"I do not know," she said. "It takes me some time to recover from
shocks; and Mr. Reffold's death was a sorrow to me. What do you think
about death? Have you any theories about life and death, and the bridge
between them? Could you say anything to help one?"
"Nothing," he answered. "Who could? And by what means?"
"Has there been no value in philosophy," she asked, "and the meditations
of learned men?"
"Philosophy!" he sneered. "What has it done for us? It has taught us
some processes of the mind's working; taught us a few wonderful things
which interest the few; but the centuries have come and gone, and the
only thing which the whole human race pants to know, remains unknown:
our beloved ones, shall we meet them, and how?--the great secret of the
universe.
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