The Little Moment of HappinessKelland, Clarence Budington
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The Little Moment of Happiness
Kelland, Clarence Budington
Man-woman relationships -- Fiction; World War, 1914-1918 -- Fiction
She drew his lips down to hers, and he knew that blind, throbbing,
winged happiness which has no language, no symbols, no words of
description, which can never be remembered except as a mysterious,
haunting ecstasy which once was living and real, which leaves behind but
the dim outline of its spirit and an elusive something as of a sweet
scent that once tingled the nostrils for an instant, to be wafted away
forever....
CHAPTER XVIII
Now commenced a brief period which was, perhaps, to be the happiest of
Kendall Ware’s whole life. It was happy because it was free from doubts
and questionings. From the depths he had mounted to the heights from
which he looked upon a world bathed in sunshine, rich in harvest,
beautiful as a world could be beautiful only when it was freed from all
evil. He saw everything as good, and it contented him. He ate of the
lotus of inexperienced youth, flavored with the pungent spice of
sophistry, and the taste of it was sweet in his mouth. Plymouth Rock had
sunk beneath its sands, the vestibule of the Presbyterian church had
vanished behind the mists of an intervening ocean. He did not think; he
only felt and acted—and was happy.
His work was interesting, and he could recognize its value, so he became
less dissatisfied with the necessity that held him far behind the
battle-line. Not that he was content, rather that he was resigned....
And at the end of the day there was Andree....
There were few evenings which they did not spend together, either by
themselves or with Bert and Madeleine, dining at home, at Poccardi’s, at
Marty’s, or in interesting, homelike little cafés across the river where
excellent food could be had very cheaply. Sometimes they went to the
theater or to the music-halls. Sometimes they strolled up and down the
Avenue du Bois de Boulogne until they were tired and then sat and talked
contentedly on springy iron chairs along the promenade. Once they walked
out that street, so crowded of evenings—that street of the ever-changing
names—Montmartre, Poissonnière, Nouvelle, St.-Denis, St.-Martin—as far
as the Place de la République. It was interesting, if tiresome. More
than once Kendall was impressed with the fact that Parisians of a
certain class take their pleasures simply and childishly. More than one
glaring palace, open at the front, showed rows upon rows of those
devices, long extinct in America, before which one could sit or stand
with the ends of a rubber tube in one’s ears and listen to such tunes as
found favor with him played by phonograph. The popularity of these
places surprised him. They were always crowded.... It seemed to him that
this was the most crowded thoroughfare in Paris, as well as one of the
most questionable. The crowds impressed him as being questionable and
bent on questionable errands.... And yet he did not know; he only
guessed. So far as his knowledge went, these folk might be the most
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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