snow glass apples

I.
The story ran—how did the story run? Everyone knew the reference to Helen
America and Mr. Grey-no-more, but no one knew exactly how it happened.
Their names were welded to the glittering timeless jewelry of romance.
Sometimes they were compared to Heloise and Abelard, whose story had been
found among books in a long-buried library. Other ages were to compare their
life with the weird, ugly-lovely story of the Go-Captain Taliano and the Lady
Dolores Oh.
Out of it all, two things stood forth—their love and the image of the great
sails, tissue-metal wings with which the bodies of people finally fluttered out
among the stars.
Mention him, and others knew her. Mention her, and they knew him. He was
the first of the inbound sailors, and she was the lady who sailed The Soul.
It was lucky that people lost their pictures. The romantic hero was a very
young-looking man, prematurely old and still quite sick when the romance
came. And Helen America, she was a freak, but a nice one: a grim, solemn, sad,
little brunette who had been born amid the laughter of humanity. She was not
the tall, confident heroine of the actresses who later played her.
She was, however, a wonderful sailor. That much was true. And with her
body and mind she loved Mr. Grey-no-more, showing a devotion which the ages
can neither surpass nor forget. History may scrape off the patina of their names
and appearances, but even history can do no more than brighten the love of
Helen America and Mr. Grey-no-more.
Both of them, one must remember, were sailors.