trivial fancy of mine. God himself can be no surer of his plan's
perfection than I am. I call this faith--faith the more perfect that it
is without condition, asking neither sign nor miracle."

"And life is so good that I've no time to whine. If this _ego_ of mine
is presently to become unnecessary in the great Plan, my faith is still
triumphant. It would be interesting to know the end, but it's not so
important as to know that I am no better--only a little wiser in certain
ways--than yesterday's murderer. Living under the perfect plan of a
perfect Creator, I need not trouble about hidden details when so many
not hidden are more vital. When, in some far-off future, we learn to
live here as fully and beautifully as we have power to, I doubt not that
in the natural ways of growth we shall learn more of this detail of life
we call 'death'--but I can imagine nothing of less consequence to one
who has faith.

"I saw a stanza the other day that tells it well:

"'We know not whence is life, nor whither death,
Know not the Power that circumscribes our breath.
But yet we do not fear; what made us men,
What gave us love, shall we not trust again?'"

While quoting the lines his eyes had been straight ahead, absently
dwelling upon the space between the slightly parted doors that gave into
the next room. But even as he spoke, the last line faltered and halted.
His glance slowly stiffened out of widening eyes to the face it had
caught there--a face new, strange, mesmeric, that all at once enchained
him soul and body. With a splendid, reckless might it assailed him--left
him dazed, deaf, speechless.

It was the face of Nancy, for the first time all its guards down. Full
upon him flamed the illumined eyes that made the face a yielding
radiance; lifted a little was the chin of gentle curves, the under lip
caught as if in that quivering eagerness she no longer breathed--the
face of Nancy, no longer wondering, Nancy at last compelled and
compelling. A moment the warm light flashed from each to each.

He stopped in a sudden bewilderment, looking blankly, questioningly at
the faces about him. Then out of the first chaos came the sense of
having awakened from some long, quiet sleep--of having suddenly opened
his eyes upon a world from which the morning mists had lifted, to see
himself--and the woman who stood always at the end of that upward
path--face to face for the first time. One by one his outer sensations
returned. At fi