he kissed her ear, and they sat for a time in silence.

"If I were to consent to this?" he said at last, in a voice that was very
gentle.

She flung her arms about him, weeping wildly. "Oh, if you would," she
sobbed, "if only you would!"

* * * * *

For a week before the operation that was to raise him from his servitude
and inferiority to the level of a blind citizen, Nunez knew nothing of
sleep, and all through the warm sunlit hours, while the others slumbered
happily, he sat brooding or wandered aimlessly, trying to bring his mind
to bear on his dilemma. He had given his answer, he had given his consent,
and still he was not sure. And at last work-time was over, the sun rose in
splendour over the golden crests, and his last day of vision began for
him. He had a few minutes with Medina-sarote before she went apart to
sleep.

"To-morrow," he said, "I shall see no more."

"Dear heart!" she answered, and pressed his hands with all her strength.

"They will hurt you but little," she said; "and you are going through this
pain--you are going through it, dear lover, for _me_... Dear, if a
woman's heart and life can do it, I will repay you. My dearest one, my
dearest with the tender voice, I will repay."

He was drenched in pity for himself and her.

He held her in his arms, and pressed his lips to hers, and looked on her
sweet face for the last time. "Good-bye!" he whispered at that dear sight,
"good-bye!"

And then in silence he turned away from her.

She could hear his slow retreating footsteps, and something in the rhythm
of them threw her into a passion of weeping.

He had fully meant to go to a lonely place where the meadows were
beautiful with white narcissus, and there remain until the hour of his
sacrifice should come, but as he went he lifted up his eyes and saw the
morning, the morning like an angel in golden armour, marching down the
steeps...

It seemed to him that before this splendour he, and this blind world in
the valley, and his love, and all, were no more than a pit of sin.

He did not turn aside as he had meant to do, but went on, and passed
through the wall of the circumference and out upon the rocks, and his eyes
were always upon the sunlit ice and snow.

He saw their infinite beauty, and his imagination soared over them to the
things beyond he was now to resign for ever.

He thought of that great free world he was parted from, the world that was
his own