o discover. It was a red, Martin, a
red so rich, so warm, so _kindled_, that all who beheld it felt warmed
in their souls, and his fellow-artists questioned and pondered, and
tried in vain to produce the same glow upon their own canvases--and the
years passed, and they grew old and weary, and still they failed. At
last one day the great man died, and those who tended him for his burial
were amazed to find a wound, an _open_ wound, above his heart. And then
at last they understood. The red of his pictures, the glow which had
warmed the world, had been painted with his own blood!"

There was silence in the garden. The scent of roses hung heavy upon the
air.

"And I," said Martin slowly. "I write in _ink_."

Grizel made no reply. She turned from the rose-bed, and passed along a
winding path which led round the herbaceous border to the slope of the
orchard beyond. It was a narrow path, too narrow for two to walk in
line, so that Martin, following, could not see her face. It was like
Grizel, he reflected, to have chosen that path at this moment. She
divined that he could speak more openly unseen.

"And even, Grizel, if I wrote in your painter's medium, my reds would
have no glow! One cannot give out what one does not possess. While I
am cold myself, how can I give out warmth? It is so long, Grizel, since
my heart was warm!"

A sigh floated back to his ears.

"_Pauvre_!" breathed the deep voice, but she did not turn her head; the
gleaming figure flitted before him down the darkening path.

"I flattered myself that I had made a brave pretence. It was a good
enough sham to delude the world, but You have found me out. Don't think
that I regret it--I am thankful to Heaven that _some one_ understands.
To be praised for what one knows to be false is a bitter pill.
Sometimes I wonder, shall I throw it all up? Settle down comfortably
into the rut, and--grow roses! I could grow good roses, Grizel; the
best of their kind. There would be no need to be ashamed."

In the twilight he saw her shake her head. A fold of the golden robe
escaped her hands, and trailed on the ground. They stooped together to
lift it up, and she smiled up at him with her sweet gay smile.

"But you couldn't, Martin; you couldn't do it! You might make a hundred
resolutions, but you'd begin again. There's no escape that way, dear
man. You must write, as you must breathe, therefore it follows that you
must get warm. Chills are depres