without ever having
the slightest conception that there could be any other?

Then Jane remembered, with comfort, the irresistible appeal made by
Truth to the soul of the artist; truth of line; truth of colour; truth
of values; and, in the realm of sound, truth of tone, of harmony, of
rendering, of conception. And when Nurse Rosemary had said of his
painting of "The Wife": "It is a triumph of art"; Garth had replied:
"It is a triumph of truth." And Jane's own verdict on the look he had
seen and depicted was: "It is true--yes, it is true!" Will he not
realise now the truth of that signature; and, if he realises it, will
he not be glad in his loneliness, that his wife should come to him;
unless the confessions and admissions of the letter cause him to put
her away as wholly unworthy?

Suddenly Jane understood the immense advantage of the fact that he
would hear every word of the rest of her letter, knowing the
conclusion, which she herself could not possibly have put first. She
saw a Higher Hand in this arrangement; and said, as she watched the
minutes slowly pass: "He hath broken down the middle wall of partition
between us"; and a sense of calm assurance descended, and garrisoned
her soul with peace.

The quarter of an hour was over.

Jane crossed the hall with firm, though noiseless, step; stood a moment
on the threshold relegating herself completely to the background; then
opened the door; and Nurse Rosemary re-entered the library.

CHAPTER XXXIV

"LOVE NEVER FAILETH"

Garth was standing at the open window, when Nurse Rosemary re-entered
the library; and he did not turn, immediately.

She looked anxiously for the letter, and saw it laid ready on her side
of the table. It bore signs of having been much crumpled; looking
almost as a letter might appear which had been crushed into a ball,
flung into the waste-paper basket, and afterwards retrieved. It had,
however, been carefully smoothed out; and lay ready to her hand.

When Garth turned from the window and passed to his chair, his face
bore the signs of a great struggle. He looked as one who, sightless,
has yet been making frantic efforts to see. The ivory pallor was gone.
His face was flushed; and his thick hair, which grew in beautiful
curves low upon his forehead and temples, and was usually carefully
brushed back in short-cropped neatness, was now ruffled and disordered.
But his voice was completely under control, as he turned towards his
secret