but you cannot keep Spring from coming.
― Pablo Neruda
"It's you, isn't it? You're the young man who's been haunting my dreams."
I stared at Clare's tear-stained face and huge sad eyes. I was at a loss for words.
Sometimes sadness can be beautiful and for those who know separation, it may occasionally be tinged with joy. That's how it was with us.
We had both found one another after who knows how long―was it decades, lifetimes or centuries? It didn't matter―all that mattered was that we were together now.
"I want to show you something," she said, and undid the clasp of a fine, gold necklace she wore and handed me a ring that had been threaded though the chain.
"There's an engraving on the inner band," she whispered.
I held the ring up to the subdued yellow light of the chandelier.
Truthfully, it was a plain gold ring without a stone―quite unremarkable as a piece of jewelry, but engraved on the inner band were the same initials I carved in The Boulders at Sleepy Hollow.
She had gotten up from her place opposite me at the table and came and sat beside me while I perused the ring.
"Do you know what those initials mean?" she asked.
"They stand for Paul and Lillian―in other words, me and you."
She began to tremble and without thinking, as if by instinct, I took her in my arms and held her. I soothed her as I always did, by gently stroking her hair.
"How can this be? she asked.
"I have no idea, Love, except to say perhaps it always was―truly, star-crossed we may have been, and perhaps still are, but nonetheless, stamped out in stars."
"You've said the most beautiful things to me in dreams, Paul Thickett, and now you're here before me wringing my heart again."
"Maybe I'm a hopeless romantic." I told her.
"You're a poet―my own Shakespeare."
I had so much to ask, I hardly knew where to begin, but strangely was fascinated by the ring and how it came to be owned by her.
She seemed to read my thoughts.
"You're probably wondering about the ring. The Lightbourne's and Yardley's were once connected by marriage. I was aways drawn to a photo I saw of Lillian Yardley. As a young child, I'd often stare at her picture and try to imagine what she was like--even down to the type of clothes she'd wear. One day I was browsing in an antique store and saw the ring and was told by the owner it was once owned by Lillian herself. So, I bought it"
I had to interrupt. "Was the store called Afterife Antiques?"
Clare's eyes widened. "How did you know?"
"I know the owner, Tess Woods, and she's trying to make an offer on the remaining of items from the Yardley estate."
"Its so sad," she said. "The family line died out and the inheritance passed to a niece. I don't think she has any intention of keeping any of the furnishings or clothing."
"She doesn't," I replied, "and that's why I made an offer to purchase the entire lot."
Clare stared at me again as she had several times from the foot of my bed, forlornly seeking her hope chest, but was now seeing those hopes fulfilled in me.