death of
her only child.

PART IV

STORM

"Myself, arch-traitor to myself;
My hollowest friend, my deadliest foe,
My clog whatever road I go."

XVII

"'Among the numerous daubs with which Tintoret, to his everlasting
shame, has covered this church--'"

"Good Heavens!--what does the man mean?--or is he talking of another
church?" said Ashe, raising his head and looking in bewilderment, first
at the magnificent Tintoret in front of him, and then at the lines he
had just been reading.

"William!" cried Kitty, "<i>do</i> put that fool down and come here; one sees
it splendidly!"

She was standing in one of the choir-stalls of San Giorgio Maggiore,
somewhat raised above the point where Ashe had been studying his German
hand-book.

"My dear, if this man doesn't know, who does!" cried Ashe, flourishing
his volume in front of him as he obeyed her.

"'Dans le royaume des aveugles,'" said Kitty, contemptuously. "As if any
German could even begin to understand Tintoret! But--don't talk!"

And clasping both hands round Ashe's arm, she stood leaning heavily upon
him, her whole soul gazing from the eyes she turned upon the picture,
her lips quivering, as though, from some physical weakness, she could
only just hold back the tears with which, indeed, the face was charged.

She and Ashe were looking at that "Last Supper" of Tintoret's which
hangs in the choir of San Giorgio Maggiore at Venice.

It is a picture dear to all lovers of Tintoret, breathing in every line
and group the passionate and mystical fancy of the master.

The scene passes, it will be remembered, in what seems to be the
spacious guest-chamber of an inn. The Lord and His disciples are
gathered round the last sacred meal of the Old Covenant, the first of
the New. On the left, a long table stretches from the spectator into the
depths of the picture; the disciples are ranged along one side of it;
and on the other sits Judas, solitary and accursed. The young Christ has
risen; He holds the bread in His lifted hands and is about to give it to
the beloved disciple, while Peter beyond, rising from his seat in his
eagerness, presses forward to claim his own part in the Lord's body.

The action of the Christ has in it a very ecstasy of giving; the bending
form, indeed, is love itself, yearning and triumphant. This is further
expressed in the light which streams from the head of the Lord, playing
upon the long line of faces, illu