That is,
methinks, a true proverb,--`If Christ be not asked at the match, He will
never make one at the marriage-feast.' And 'tis a sorry feast where He
sitteth not at the table."

"I think He shall not be absent from this," said Isoult, softly.

So Kate went to Crowe with her parents; but her baby brother Walter, a
year old, was left behind in charge of Jennifer.

The evening after their arrival, the bride took Isoult apart, and,
rather to her surprise, asked her if she thought that the dead knew what
was passing in this world. To such a question there was but one answer.
Isoult could not tell.

"Isoult," she said, her eyes filling with tears, "I would not have him
know of this, if it be so. And can that be right and good which I would
not he should know?"

Isoult needed not to ask her who "he" was.

"Nay, sweet heart!" said she, "thinkest thou he would any thing save thy
comfort and gladness? He is passed into the land where (saith David)
all things are forgotten--to wit, (I take it) all things earthly and
carnal, all things save God; and when ye shall meet again in the body,
it shall be in that resurrection where they neither marry nor are given
in marriage, but are equal unto the angels."

"All things forgotten!" she faltered. "Hath he forgot me? They must
sleep, then; that is a kind of forgetting. But if I were awake and
witful, I never could forget him. It were not _I_ that did so."

"Let us leave that with God, beloved," answered Isoult.

"O Isoult," she murmured, her tears beginning to drop fast, "I would do
God's will, and leave all to Him: but is this God's will? Thou little
knowest how I am tortured and swayed to and fro with doubt. It was
easier for thee, that hadst but a contract to fulfil."

Isoult remembered the time before she had ever seen her husband, when it
did not look very easy. She scarcely knew what she ought to answer.
She only said--

"Dear heart, if thou do truly desire to do only God's will, methinks He
will pardon thee if thou lose thy way."

"It looketh unto me at times," she said, "as if it scarce could be
right, seeing it should lift me above want, and set me at ease."

This was a new thought to Isoult, and she was puzzled what to say. But
in the evening she told John, and asked his advice. Much to her
astonishment, he, usually gentle, pulled to the casement with a bang.

"Is that thine answer, Jack?" said Isoult, laughing.

"Somewhat like it," answered he