“This parting cannot be for long”

“This parting cannot be for long” is the central line of a passage Paul McGill recalls to Emma Harte as they face his departure. Invoking words attributed to Abélard to Héloïse, he makes literary memory a means of consolation: physical separation, he urges, need not break the bond between two people who love one another.

The remembered passage

Paul tells Emma that he read the passage at Oxford years earlier and that it had stayed with him. He quotes its assurance that lovers cannot truly be parted, because they remain “united in thought,” and likens thought to “a great magnet.” The passage turns from reason to faith, giving Paul language for a separation that argument alone cannot make easier.

The scene of reassurance

The words come as Emma’s hand shakes around a glass of champagne. Paul takes the glass from her, draws her close, and sees tears in her eyes; when she asks who spoke the lines, he names Abélard and Héloïse and insists that their words remain true. He asks Emma to have faith in their continuing union and promises to carry her in his heart for the rest of his life.

Meaning within the parting

Emma answers that she loves Paul and cannot bear to be without him. The passage does not remove the immediate pain of departure; instead, it gives their separation a language of inward closeness, setting thought and faith against physical absence. Paul then asks her not to dwell on his leaving and turns her attention to the hours they still have together, making the remembered declaration both a promise about the future and a consolation for the present.