"As soon as you opened the door."

"What did you see?"

"The loveliest thing I'd ever seen."

"I'm not really--am I?"

"I used to dream about you at night on my watches. I made you up out of bits of the night--white moonlight, black clouds, and stars. Sometimes I would take the last cloud of sunset for your lips. And the wind, when it was gentle, for your voice. And the movements of the sea for your movements, and the rise and fall of it for your breathing, and the lap of it against the boat for your kisses. Oh, child, look up!..."

She looked up....

"What's your name?"

"Helen."

"I can't hear you."

"Helen. Say it."

"I'm trying to."

"I can't hear YOU now. And I want to hear your voice say my name. Oh, my boy, do say it, so that I can remember it when you're away."

"I can't say it, child. Why didn't you tell me your name?"

"What is yours?"

"I'm trying to tell you."

"Please--please!"

"I'm trying with all my might. Listen with all yours."

"I am listening. I can't hear anything. Yet I'm listening so hard that it hurts. I want to say your name over and over and over to myself when you're away. CAN'T you say it louder?"

"No, it's no good."

"Oh, why didn't you tell me, boy?"

"Oh, child, why didn't you tell me?"

"Is my bread sweet to you?"

"The sweetest I ever ate. I ate it slowly, and took each bit from your hand. I kept one crust."

"And my corn."

"Oh, your corn! that is everlasting. You have sown your seed. I have eaten a grain, and it bore its harvest. One by one I shall eat them, and every grain will bear its full harvest. You have replenished the unknown earth with fields of golden corn, and set me walking there for ever."

"And you have thrown golden light upon strange waters, and set me floating there for ever. Oh, you on my earth and I on your ocean, how shall we meet?"

"Your corn is my waters, my waters are your corn. They move on one wave. Oh, child, we are borne on it together, for ever."

"But how you teased me!"

"I couldn't help it."

"You and your boats and your duckponds."

"It was such fun. You were so serious. It was so easy to tease you."

"Why did you put your hand over your mouth?"

"To keep myself from--"

"Laughing at me?"

"Kissing you. You looked so sorry because sailors only sail round duckponds, when you thought they always sailed out by the West and home by the East. You believed the duckponds."

"I didn't really."

"For a moment!"

"I felt so stupid."

"You blushed."

"Oh, did I?"

"A very little. Like the inside of a sh.e.l.l. I'd always tease you to make you blush like that. Don't you ever smile or laugh, child?"

"You might teach me to. I haven't had the sort of life that makes one smile and laugh. Oh, but I could. I could smile and laugh for you if you wished. I could do anything you wanted. I could be anything you wanted."

"Shall I make something of you? What shall it be?"

"I don't care, so long as it is yours. Oh, make something of me. I've been lonely always. I don't want to be any more. I want to be able to come to you when I please, not only because I need so much to come, but because you need me to come. Can you make me sure that you need me?

When no one has ever needed you, how can you believe...? Oh, no, no!

don't look sorry. I do believe it. And will you always stand with me here in the loneliness that has been so dark? Then it won't be dark any more. Why do two people make light? One alone only wanders and holds out her hand and finds no one--nothing. Sometimes not even herself.

Will you be with me always?"

"Always."

"Why?"

"Because I love you."