`` It is very hard , '' said Anne sorrowfully . `` We -- her friends here -- all know how hard it is for her . '' `` And she is so richly fitted for life , '' said Owen rebelliously . `` Her beauty is the least of her dower -- and she is the most beautiful woman I 've ever known . That laugh of hers ! I 've angled all summer to evoke that laugh , just for the delight of hearing it . And her eyes -- they are as deep and blue as the gulf out there . I never saw such blueness -- and gold ! Did you ever see her hair down , Mrs. Blythe ? '' `` No . '' `` I did -- once . I had gone down to the Point to go fishing with Captain Jim but it was too rough to go out , so I came back . She had taken the opportunity of what she expected to be an afternoon alone to wash her hair , and she was standing on the veranda in the sunshine to dry it . It fell all about her to her feet in a fountain of living gold . When she saw me she hurried in , and the wind caught her hair and swirled it all around her -- Danae in her cloud . Somehow , just then the knowledge that I loved her came home to me -- and realised that I had loved her from the moment I first saw her standing against the darkness in that glow of light . And she must live on here -- petting and soothing Dick , pinching and saving for a mere existence , while I spend my life longing vainly for her , and debarred , by that very fact , from even giving her the little help a friend might . I walked the shore last night , almost till dawn , and thrashed it all out over and over again . And yet , in spite of everything , I ca n't find it in my heart to be sorry that I came to Four Winds . It seems to me that , bad as everything is , it would be still worse never to have known Leslie .
It 's burning , searing pain XXXXX love her and leave her -- but not to have loved her is unthinkable .
around as by for of on out over that to