Random Harvest
Page 31
"If we meet him, what are you going to say?"
"I don't know. I can't know—before I see him."
"He'll wonder why on earth we've come HERE, of all places."
"Then we'll ask him why on earth HE'S here. Perhaps we'll both have to pretend we came to look at the five counties."
She resumed the climb, and in another moment we could see that the summit dipped again to a further summit, perhaps higher, and that in the hollow between lay a little pond. There was a man lying beside it with arms outstretched, as if he had flung himself there after the climb. He did not move as we approached, but presently we saw smoke curling from a cigarette between his fingers.
"He's not asleep," I said. "He's just resting."
I saw her eyes and the way her lips trembled; something suddenly occurred to me. "By the way, how did you know there were FIVE counties?"
But she didn't answer; already she was rushing down the slope. He saw her in time to rise to his feet; she stopped then, several yards away, and for a few seconds both were staring at each other, hard and still and silent. Then he whispered something I couldn't hear; but I knew in a flash that the gap was closed, that the random years were at an end, that the past and the future would join. She knew this too, for she ran into his arms calling out: "Oh, Smithy—Smithy—it may not be too late!"
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