When Siegmund had Helena near, he lost the ache, the yearning towards
something, which he always felt otherwise. She seemed to connect him
with the beauty of things, as if she were the nerve through which he
received intelligence of the sun, and wind, and sea, and of the moon and
the darkness. Beauty she never felt herself came to him through her. It
is that makes love. He could always sympathize with the wistful little
flowers, and trees lonely in their crowds, and wild, sad seabirds. In
these things he recognized the great yearning, the ache outwards towards
something, with which he was ordinarily burdened. But with Helena, in
this large sea-morning, he was whole and perfect as the day.

'Will it be fine all day?' he asked, when a cloud came over.

'I don't know,' she replied in her gentle, inattentive manner, as if she
did not care at all. 'I think it will be a mixed day--cloud and
sun--more sun than cloud.'

She looked up gravely to see if he agreed. He turned from frowning at
the cloud to smile at her. He seemed so bright, teeming with life.

'I like a bare blue sky,' he said; 'sunshine that you seem to stir about
as you walk.'

'It is warm enough here, even for you,' she smiled.

'Ah, here!' he answered, putting his face down to receive the radiation
from the stone, letting his fingers creep towards Helena's. She laughed,
and captured his fingers, pressing them into her hand. For nearly an
hour they remained thus in the still sunshine by the sea-wall, till
Helena began to sigh, and to lift her face to the little breeze that