Brokaw would follow two or three
days later.
A heavy weight seemed lifted from Philip's shoulders when he left
Brokaw. After months of worry and weeks of physical inaction he
saw his way clear for the first time. And for the first time, too,
something seemed to have come into his life that filled him with a
strange exhilaration, and made him forgetful of the gloom that had
settled over him during these last months. That night he would see
Jeanne. His body thrilled at the thought, until for a time he
forgot that he would also see and talk with Eileen. A few days
before he had told Gregson that it would be suicidal to fight the
northerners; now he was eager for action, eager to begin and end
the affair--to win or lose. If he had stopped to analyze the
change in himself he would have found that the beautiful girl whom
he had first seen on the moonlit rock was at the bottom of it. And
yet Jeanne was a northerner, one of those against whom his actions
must be directed. But he had confidence in himself, confidence in
what that night would bring forth. He was like one freed from a
bondage that had oppressed him for a long time, and the fact that
he might be compelled to fight Jeanne's own people did not destroy
his hopefulness, the new joy and excitement that he had found in
life.
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