"I will talk about it," he declared, trembling. "I have thought it all
out," and this time it was her fingers that tightened. "You are going
away. And presently--when you are free--I will come to you."

For a moment the current stopped.

"No, no!" she cried, almost in terror. The first fatalist must have been
a woman, and the vision of rent prison bars drove her mad. "No, we could
never be happy."

"We can--we will be happy," he said, with a conviction that was unshaken.
"Do you hear me? I will not debase what I have to say by resorting to
comparisons. But--others I know have been happy are happy, though their
happiness cannot be spoken of with ours. Listen. You will go away--for a
little while--and afterwards we shall be together for all time. Nothing
shall separate us: We never have known life, either of us, until now. I,
missing you, have run after the false gods. And you--I say it with
truth-needed me. We will go to live at Grenoble, as my father and mother
lived. We will take up their duties there. And if it seems possible, I
will go into public life. When I return, I shall find you--waiting for
me--in the garden."

So real had the mirage become, that Honora did not answer. The desert and
its journey fell away. Could such a thing, after all, be possible? Did
fate deal twice to those whom she had made novices? The mirage, indeed,
suddenly became reality--a mirage only because she had proclaimed it
such. She had beheld in it, as he spoke, a Grenoble which was paradise
regained. And why should paradise regained be a paradox? Why paradise
regained? Paradise gained. She had never known it, until he had flung
wide the gates. She had sought for it, and never found it until now, and
her senses doubted it. It was a paradise of love, to be sure; but one,
too, of duty. Duty made it real. Work was there, and fulfilment of the
purpose of life itself. And if his days hitherto had been useless, hers
had in truth been barren.

It was only of late, after a life-long groping, that she had discovered
their barrenness. The right to happiness! Could she begin anew, and found
it upon a rock? And was he the rock?

The question startled her, and she drew away from him first her hand, and
then she turned her body, staring at him with widened eyes. He did not
resist the movement; nor could he, being male, divine what was passing
within her, though he watched her anxiously. She had no thought of the
first days,--but afterwards. For at