nged from the woman he knew. Margaret,
still not turning to him, muttered, "Do not look at me, please. For I
am ugly and unhappy and afraid and nearly mad. And here are your
brothers' shirts." She gave him the four shirts, restored to
themselves. He took them silently. "And here," continued Margaret, "is
her wedding-smock."

And Hobb took it from her, and saw that out of his own shirt, washed
and bleached, she had made a lovely garment. And round it, from the hem
upward, ran a climbing briar of exquisite delicacy, and with a
beautiful design of spines and leaves; but the only flower upon it was
a golden rose, worked on the heart of the smock in her own gold hair.
And Hobb took it from her and again said nothing.

Then Margaret with a great cry, as though her heart were breaking,
gasped, "Go! go quickly! I have done what you wanted. Go!"

"Yes, dear," said Hobb, "but you must come with me."

She turned then, whispering, "How can I go with you? What do you mean?"
And she looked in his eyes and saw in them such infinite compassion and
tenderness that she was overwhelmed, and swayed where she stood. And
then his arms, which she had never expected to feel again, closed round
her body, and she lay helplessly against him, and heard him say, "Love
Margaret, you are my only love, and you worked the wedding-smock for
yourself. Oh, Margaret, did you think I had another love?"

She looked at him blankly as though she could not understand, and her
face was full of wonder and joy and fright. And she hung away from him
sobbing, "No, no, no! I cannot. I must not. I am not good enough."

"Which of us is good enough?" said Hobb. "So then we must all come to
love for help."

And she cried again in an agony, "No, no, no! There is evil in me. And
I lived alone and had nothing, nothing that ever lasted, for I was born
on High and Over in the crossways of the winds, and they were the
godfathers of my birth. And all my life they have blown things to and
from me. And I tried to keep what they blew me; and I gave their
hearts' desire to all comers, and took in exchange the best they could
give me; for I thought that if it was fair for them to take, it was
fair for me to take too. But nothing that I took mattered longer than a
week or a day or an hour, neither laughter nor courage nor beauty nor
wisdom--all, all were unstable till the winds blew me you. And as I
looked at you lying there unconscious, something, I knew not what,
seemed dif