Rowland had never known anything so divinely soothing as the
dreamy softness of that early autumn afternoon. The iridescent mountains
shut him in; the little waves, beneath him, fretted the white pebbles at
the laziest intervals; the festooned vines above him swayed just visibly
in the all but motionless air.
Roderick lay observing it all with his arms thrown back and his hands
under his head. "This suits me," he said; "I could be happy here and
forget everything. Why not stay here forever?" He kept his position for
a long time and seemed lost in his thoughts. Rowland spoke to him, but
he made vague answers; at last he closed his eyes. It seemed to Rowland,
also, a place to stay in forever; a place for perfect oblivion of the
disagreeable. Suddenly Roderick turned over on his face, and buried it
in his arms. There had been something passionate in his movement; but
Rowland was nevertheless surprised, when he at last jerked himself back
into a sitting posture, to perceive the trace of tears in his eyes.
Roderick turned to his friend, stretching his two hands out toward the
lake and mountains, and shaking them with an eloquent gesture, as if his
heart was too full for utterance.
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