'You are sure you're not too tired?' she reiterated.
He laughed.
Outside, the sea-mist was white and woolly. They went hand in hand. It
was cold, so she thrust her hand with his into the pocket of his
overcoat, while they walked together.
'I like the mist,' he said, pressing her hand in his pocket.
'I don't dislike it,' she replied, shrinking nearer to him.
'It puts us together by ourselves,' he said. She plodded alongside,
bowing her head, not replying. He did not mind her silence.
'It couldn't have happened better for us than this mist,' he said.
She laughed curiously, almost with a sound of tears.
'Why?' she asked, half tenderly, half bitterly.
'There is nothing else but you, and for you there is nothing else but
me--look!' He stood still. They were on the downs, so that Helena found herself
quite alone with the man in a world of mist. Suddenly she flung herself
sobbing against his breast. He held her closely, tenderly, not knowing
what it was all about, but happy and unafraid.
In one hollow place the siren from the Needles seemed to bellow full in
their ears. Both Siegmund and Helena felt their emotion too intense.
They turned from it.
'What is the pitch?' asked Helena.
'Where it is horizontal? It slides up a chromatic scale,' said Siegmund.
'Yes, but the settled pitch--is it about E?' 'E!' exclaimed Siegmund. 'More like F.' 'Nay, listen!' said Helena.
They stood still and waited till there came the long booing of the
fog-horn.
'There!' exclaimed Siegmund, imitating the sound. 'That is not E.' He
repeated the sound. 'It is F.' 'Surely it is E,' persisted Helena.
'Even F sharp,' he rejoined, humming the note.
She laughed, and told him to climb the chromatic scale.
'But you agree?' he said.
'I do not,' she replied.
The fog was cold. It seemed to rob them of their courage to talk.
'What is the note in _Tristan_?' Helena made an effort to ask.
'That is not the same,' he replied.
'No, dear, that is not the same,' she said in low, comforting tones. He
quivered at the caress. She put her arms round him reached up her face
yearningly for a kiss. He forgot they were standing in the public
footpath, in daylight, till she drew hastily away. She heard footsteps
down the fog.
As they climbed the path the mist grew thinner, till it was only a grey
haze at the top. There they were on the turfy lip of the land. The sky
was fairly clear overhead. Below them the sea was singing hoarsely
to itself.