, and in all these
years in which I haven't been happy at all! That was the spirit of the
contract then, I suppose--but now it's different. It confuses me a
little. Doesn't it confuse you?"

"Perhaps."

"Let me take your hand again; I can talk to you better like that.
Now--_now_--we've undertaken new responsibilities. We've involved
others. We've let them involve themselves. We can't turn our back upon
them, can we? No. I thought that's what you'd say. We can't. The
contract we've made with them must come before the one we made with each
other. We're bound, not only in law but in honor. Aren't we?"

He made some inarticulate sign of assent.

"And I suppose that's what he meant by the penalty--the penalty in its
extreme form: that we've put ourselves where we can't keep the higher
contract, the complete one, we made together--because we're bound by one
lower and incomplete, to which we've got to be faithful. Isn't that the
spirit _now_, don't you think?"

Again he muttered something inarticulately assenting.

"Well, then, Chip, I'm going." She rose with the words.

"No, no; not yet." He caught her hand in both of his, holding it as he
leaned across the table.

"Yes, Chip, now. What do we gain by my staying? We see the thing we've
got to do--and we must do it. We must begin on the instant. If I were to
stay a minute longer now, it would be--it would be for things we've
recognized as no longer permissible. I'm going. I'm going now!"

There was something in her face that induced him to relax his hold. She
withdrew her hand slowly, her eyes on his.

"Aren't you going to say good-by?"

She shook her head, from the little doorway of the rotunda. "No. What's
the use? What good-by is possible between you and me? I'm--I'm just
going."

And she was gone.

With a quick movement he sprang to the opening between two of the small
pillars. "Edith!" She turned. "Edith! Come here. Come here, for God's
sake! Only one word more."

She came back slowly, not to the door, but to the opening through which
he leaned, his knee on the seat inside. "What is it?"

He got possession of her hand. "Tell me again that quotation he gave
us."

She repeated it: "'The letter killeth, but the Spirit giveth life.'"

"Good, isn't it? I suppose it _is_ from Shakespeare?"

"I don't know. I'll ask him--I'll look it up. If ever I see you again
I'll tell you."

"I wish you would, because--because, if it gives us _life_, perhaps
it'll carr