“God in His mercy be praised for that one blessing!” Witherle muttered. But Lowndes went on as if he did not hear: “But you might think of your wife.” “I have thought of her--too much. I thought about everything too much. I am tired of thinking,” said Witherle. “I wonder if you understand?” “Not in the least.” Witherle looked about him restlessly. “Come where we can talk--down there on that pile of boards. I think I’d like to talk. It is very simple when once you understand it.” He led the way to the opposite end of the bridge, and down an embankment to a lumber-pile at the water’s edge. Up the river the May sun had gone down in splendor, leaving the water crimson-stained. Witherle sat down where he could look along the river-reaches. “Hold on a minute, Witherle. Don’t talk to me unless you are sure you want to.” “That’s all right. There’s nothing much to tell. I don’t seem to mind your understanding.” Witherle was silent a minute. “It is very simple,” he said again. “This is the way I think about it. Either you do the things you want to do in this world or else you don’t. I had never done what I wanted until I left home. I didn’t mean to hurt anybody by coming away in that style, and I don’t think that I did. I’d rather not be selfish, but life got so dull. I couldn’t stand it. I had to have a change. I had to come. The things you have to do you do. There was a Frenchman once who committed suicide and left a note that said: ‘Tired of this eternal buttoning and unbuttoning.’ I know how he felt. I don’t know how other men manage to live. Perhaps their work means more to them than mine had come to mean to me. It was just dull, that was all, and I had to come.” Lowndes stared. Truly it was delightfully simple. “Why, man, you can’t chuck your responsibilities overboard like that. Your wife----” “When I was twenty-one,” interrupted Witherle, “I was in love. The girl married somebody else. Before I met my wife she had cared for a man who married another woman. You see how it was. We were going to save the pieces together. As a business arrangement that sort of thing is all right. I haven’t a word to say against it. She is a good woman, and we got on as well as most people, only life was not ecstasy to either of us. Can’t you see us tied together, snaking our way along through existence as if it were some gray desert, and we crawling on and on over the sand, always with our faces bent to it, and nothing showing itself in our way but the white bones of the men and women who had travelled along there before us--grinning skulls mostly? Can’t you see it?”