away to the entrance of the
chapel.

'Wait a little longer,' said Elena. 'You seem afraid of me. But I am
braver than you,' she added, a faint tremor passing suddenly over her
whole body. 'I can tell you... shall I?... how it was you found me here?
Do you know where I was going?'

Insarov looked in bewilderment at Elena,

'I was going to you.'

'To me?'

Elena hid her face. 'You mean to force me to say that I love you,' she
whispered. 'There, I have said it.'

'Elena!' cried Insarov.

She took his hands, looked at him, and fell on his breast.

He held her close to him, and said nothing. There was no need for him
to tell her he loved her. From that cry alone, from the instant
transformation of the whole man, from the heaving of the breast to which
she clung so confidingly, from the touch of his finger tips in her hair,
Elena could feel that she was loved. He did not speak, and she needed
no words. 'He is here, he loves me... what need of more?' The peace of
perfect bliss, the peace of the harbour reached after storm, of the end
attained, that heavenly peace which gives significance and beauty even
to death, filled her with its divine flood. She desired nothing, for she
had gained all. 'O my brother, my friend, my dear one!' her lips were
whispering, while she did not know whose was this heart, his or her own,
which beat so blissfully, and melted against her bosom.

He stood motionless, folding in his strong embrace the young life
surrendered to him; he felt against his heart this new, infinitely
precious burden; a passion of tenderness, of gratitude unutterable, was
crumbling his hard will to dust, and tears unknown till now stood in his
eyes.

She did not weep; she could only repeat, 'O my friend, my brother!'

'So you will follow me everywhere?' he said to her, a quarter of an hour
later, still enfolding her and keeping her close to him in his arms.

'Everywhere, to the ends of the earth. Where you are, I will be.'

'And you are not deceiving yourself, you know your parents will never
consent to our marriage?'

'I don't deceive myself; I know that.'

'You know that I'm poor--almost a beggar.'

'I know.'

'That I'm not a Russian, that it won't be my fate to live in Russia,
that you will have to break all your ties with your country, with your
people.'

'I know, I know.'

'Do you know, too, that I have given myself up to a difficult, thankless
cause, that I... that we shall have to expose ourse