"By Jove, this is peaceful!" said Saltash, and stopped to caress the old
dog with a gentle hand. "Do you know, Maud, it's a good thing you never
married me if this sort of thing makes you happy."
She smiled her quiet, contented smile. "I think it is a good thing too,
Charlie. It certainly would never have satisfied you."
"Nothing does," he declared restlessly. "I'm a wanderer on the face of
the earth, and I don't pick up much as I go along. I'm getting old, you
know. Life isn't what it was."
Maud was silent for a few moments, the starlight in her eyes. "I
sometimes wonder," she said at length, "if you have ever really lived
yet."
He laughed on a mocking note. "My dear girl, I--who have done
everything!"
She shook her head. "No, not everything, Charlie."
"Everything that's bad," he suggested recklessly.
She put out a hand to him that went into his quick hold and lay there
with perfect confidence. "I don't think you're really old," she said. "I
think you're just beginning to grow up. No, don't laugh! I am quite
serious. You are just beginning to discriminate between the things that
are worth while and those that are not."
"Is anything worth while?" said Saltash.
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