She stood by the low wall which kept the garden from the precipice; and
when she had looked eastward to Italy, and westward where the prostrate
giant of the Tete de Chien mourns over Monaco, she turned toward the
arbour in which the cure had told her to wait. Most of the big gold and
copper grape-leaves had fallen now, but some were left, crisped by
frost until they seemed to have been cut from thin sheets of metal; and
over the mass of knotted branches rained a torrent of freshly opened
roses. They and their foliage made a thick screen, and Mary could not
see the inside of the arbour; but as she reached the entrance Vanno
stood just within, waiting for her, very pale, but with a light on his
face other than the sunlight which streamed over him. Then Mary knew
that something, more intimately herself than was her reasoning mind, had
expected him, and had never believed that he would refuse to come.

He held out both hands, without a word; and without a word she gave him
hers. He lifted them to his lips, and kissed first one, then the other.
Still keeping her hands fast, he drew them down so that her arms were
held straight at her sides. Standing thus, they looked into each other's
eyes, and the glory of the sun reflected back from Vanno's almost
dazzled Mary. Never in her life had she known happiness like this. She
felt that such a moment was worth being born for, even if there were no
after joy in a long gray existence; and the truth of what she had many
times read without believing, pierced to her heart, like a bright beam
from heaven: the truth that love is the one thing on earth which God
meant to last forever.

"Will you forgive me?" Vanno asked, his eyes holding hers.

"Yes," she said. "And will you forgive me, for not forgiving you?"

"How could you forgive me, when you thought of me as you did? But you
know now that you thought wrong."

"Yes. I know. Though I don't know how I know."

"And I know you to be _yourself_. That means everything. I can't say it
in any other way. Because it was your real self I knew at
Marseilles--the self I've known always, and waited for, and am unworthy
of at last."

"Don't call yourself unworthy."

"I won't talk about that part at all--not yet. I love you--love you!
and--God! how I need you."

"And I----"

"You love me?"

He loosed her hands, and catching her up, lifted her off her feet, her
slight body crushed against his, her head pressed back; and so he kissed
he