trite penitence for that
pledge of other days that he had broken.

His arms were around her. God, the sorrow and the misery he had
brought to her, who had so freely laid aside her own happiness that
he--that he-- He drew her closer still.

"Marie-Louise, are you happy?" he cried out, and it was his soul that
spoke, yearning, pleading fiercely for the assurance that meant all in
life to him now, the assurance that alone could stand, radiant and
thankful, where before, in keen, bitter pangs of remorse, had stood the
memories of the past--of her betrayal. "Marie-Louise, are you happy?"
he cried out again.

"I did not know that one could be so happy, Jean," she said softly--and
her hand lifted to touch his face, and linger there, smoothing the hair
back from his forehead.

They were silent for a little while in each other's arms--a deep peace,
a quiet thankfulness in their hearts.

And then Jean spoke again.

"Look, Marie-Louise!" he said, and pointed out far over the waters to
the horizon line ahead. "It is the dawn. _Our_ dawn, Marie-Louise.
The dawn of the day when we shall be together always."

Grey it was in the east; faint and timorous streaks of light that
seemed like skirmishers flung out in tentative attack upon the massed
blackness of the night.

Her hands tightened about him.

"To-day! Oh, Jean! It is like a dream--like a wonderful dream that
the _bon Dieu_ has brought to us."

He drew her head to his shoulder. Presently, when in the east that
greyness should have grown pink and golden with awakening day, he would
drink in the pure, glorious beauty of the sweet, chaste face, look into
the dark, brave, tender eyes and read in her soul the happiness that
God had restored to them; but now he could only hold her close and feel
the lithe young form against his own, and feel her heart throb against
his breast.

"A dream, little one, that shall always last," he said. "Ah,
Marie-Louise, it is our dawn, our day, the beginning of a new life,
_cherie_, where there shall be only love--our love, yours and mine, the
love of old friends, of those we love, the love of work--ah, you shall
see what that will be!" His voice thrilled suddenly. "You shall see,
for now Bidelot shall have that 'touch' he asked for--for now I know!
I know! It was you I modelled, Marie-Louise--your face, your form--and
they were perfect, beautiful; but I was blind to what was most
beautiful of all! I modelled only features--an