brought no charge, that you must
defend him to me. Do you love him?"

She did not answer.

"Look at me!" he insisted. Her troubled eyes turned toward his, but
dared not stay, and the lashes fell again.

"Do not commit the crime of marrying a man you do not love," he pleaded.

"But," said the girl slowly, "even if I gave him up I might not care
for you."

"Dear," he said softly, "you do love me. Is it not so?"

She shook her head, but her face belied her.

"I have waited, waited for you," he pleaded, in that low tone to which
her being vibrated as to masterful music, "so many lifetimes! I have
found you out at last!"

"How long?" she asked willfully.

"Aeons," he answered. "Since the foundation of the world. I have
waited, and now that I have found you, I will not let you go. I will
not let you go!"

She looked at him with wide-opened eyes: a solemn fear possessed her.
Was it Bertuccio's story of yesterday that filled her with foreboding?
Hardly. Rather it seemed a pleasant thought that he and she should
feel the bark of one of these great trees closing round them, and
should have so beautiful a screen of brown bark and green moss to hide
their love from all the world. No, no fear could touch the thought of
any destiny with him: she was afraid only of herself.

"You are putting a mere nothing between us," the voice went on. "You
are pretending that there is an obstacle when there is none, really."

"Only another man's happiness," murmured the girl.

"I doubt if he knows what happiness is," said Apollo. "Forgive me, but
will he not be as happy with his altar candles and his chants without
you? Does he not care more for the abstract cause for which he is
working than for you? Hasn't he missed the simple meaning of human
life, and can anything teach it to him?"

"How did you know?" asked Daphne, startled.

"The gods should divine some things that are not told! Besides, I know
the man," he answered, smiling, but Daphne did not hear. She had leaned
back and closed her eyes. The warm, sweet air, with its odor of earth,
wooed her; the little breeze that made so faint a rustle in the ilex
leaves touched her cheek like quick, fluttering kisses. The rhythmical
drops from the fountain seemed falling to the music of an old order of
things, some simple, elemental way of loving that made harmony through
all life. Could love, that had meant only duty, have anything to do
with this great joy in mere be