He knew he would come back, knew it with stinging shame, but he could not tell her.

It had all turned out so differently from what he had dreamed.

If he had not loved her he would not have felt defeat.

To have made her his wife would have been to protect her, to possess her even after he was dead.
At the last she let him go.

He felt her watching him, and he carried her lingering clasp away with him, to burn and to thrill and to haunt, and yet to comfort him in lonely hours.
But the next day the old spirit resurged anew, and unreconciled to defeat, he turned to what was left him.