tness,
To wring from out thy soul a cry
That God may hear and bless;
Lest heaven's own palm fade in my hand,
And, pale among the saints I stand
A saint companionless."

Constance was lying on a couch near the fire propped up by many pillows.
She felt weaker than usual: what she had gone through in the morning had
exhausted her. Guy never knew, till long after, that the effort she had
made to secure the meeting with him had, in all human probability,
shortened her life by weeks. She thought it cheaply purchased at that
price--and she was right. Even the excitement of the moment had hardly
brought a tinge of color into the pure waxen cheeks, but the beautiful
clear eyes were more brilliant than ever. A ribbon of the blue which was
Guy's favorite was twisted in her bright glossy hair.

He saw nothing of this at first; he did not see her raise herself with a
faint joyful cry as he advanced with his eyes cast down; he never knew
how it was that he found himself kneeling by Constance, with her arms
clinging fondly round his neck, and her voice murmuring in his ear, "I
said you would come--I knew you would come."

Though her soft cheek lay so very near his lips, they never touched it.
He drew back, shuddering all over, and said, hoarsely,

"I can not; I dare not; I am not worthy."

I do not know if she guessed what he meant, but she tried to lift his
head, which was bent down on the cushion beside her, so that he might
look into her true eyes as she answered,

"You must not think that--you must not say so. I know you have been
angry and almost mad for many months, but you are not so now, and you
never will be any more. It was my fault--yes, mine. If I had not been so
cold and proud, you would never have left me. You thought I did not love
you; but I did; my own, my darling, I did--so dearly!"

All Guy's stout manhood was shivered within him, utterly and suddenly,
as 4000 years ago the rock was cloven in Horeb, the Mount of God. Now,
too, from the rift in the granite the waters flowed; the first tears
that he had shed since he was a very little child--the last that any
mortal saw there--streamed hot and blinding from his eyes down on the
thin, transparent hand that he held fast.

Would those with whom he was a by-word for hard sternness of character
have known him then? They would have been almost as much surprised to
see Constance Brandon--thought so haughty and cold--overcoming her
te