“_.... the joys of the road are chiefly these— A crimson touch on the hard-wood trees.... A vagrant’s morning, wide and blue, In early fall, when the wind walks, too.... A shadowy highway, cool and brown, Alluring up and enticing down.... A scrap of gossip at the ferry, And a comrade neither glum nor merry, Asking nothing, revealing naught, But minting his words from a fund of thought.... A keeper of silence eloquent...._ “Mm.... “_With only another mile to wend, And two brown arms at the journey’s end...._ “I forget the rest of it.” “You are forgetting everything that’s important!” Rose-Ann complained. “I’ll bet you know by heart Professor Humptydink’s law of dramatic crisis.” “No—I’ve stopped that foolishness, thanks to you. If I ever write anything, it will be just what I want to write—and the devil take the Great American Public!” “No, Felix—that’s wrong, too. It’s what one really wants to say that other people really like—I’m sure of it. Can’t you trust yourself?” “I don’t know,” he said, looking up at the pale moon through a tangle of leafy branches. “Somehow I have the notion that anything I want to do will be foolish.... I used to trust in myself. I used to believe this sort of thing:—it’s by Bliss Carman, the man that wrote the vagabond poems.— “‘_Keep thou, by some large instinct, Unwasted, fair and whole, The innocence of nature, The ardor of the soul—_ “_And through the realms of being Thou art at liberty To pass, enjoy, and linger, Inviolate, and free!_’” “And don’t you believe that now, Felix?” “That I can do as I please, if—” “If it’s what you really please to do! Yes, Felix. You can have any happiness you ever want, if you really want it—not cynically, nor because other people seem to have it, but because it _belongs_ to you. I believe that. I don’t intend ever to keep from doing anything I want to do. And I shan’t be ashamed of myself, either. Do you remember the girl-goldsmith I told you about, in the story?” “I remember her very well,” said Felix. “I know one of her speeches almost by heart. ‘The only sins are telling lies, and not keeping one’s body clean, and being careless about one’s work—ugly things. Beautiful things—the things people sometimes call sins—aren’t sins at all. Being in love isn’t ever a sin.’” “Yes,” said Rose-Ann dreamily. “I want us to be like that—not afraid of life, or of any of the beautiful things life brings us.” Well ... yes ... it sounded simple enough. To live life beautifully, and not be afraid! He had believed in that once. But now—or had he really ceased to believe it possible? At this moment, in the moonlight, it did not seem so absurd.... “Good night, Felix.”