e, what you are to me?"

The girl laughed happily. "If you'll be sure and only tell the truth!"

"The truth--of course! How could I help it? Now, listen. Once I was
in a big town, where there was a picture gallery, and lots of marble
statues--like the old Greeks used to make. You've read about them,
haven't you?"

"Yes, I think so. But I've never seen them."

"Well, there were lots of these statues, white as snow, and looking
just like life. And they were all naked, with never a rag to cover
them, but for all that one could look at them, as calm and pure as on
the face of God. For they were so beautiful that one could think
of nothing but the sacred beauty God has given to the human form.
And--can you guess what I'm going to say now?"

"How should I guess?" said the girl, looking down shyly, as if with
some inkling she would not confess of what was in his mind.

"Just this--you are like that to me: a marble statue, white and cool,
with a beauty that is holy in itself. And I thank God that made you so
beautiful and pure."

"Now you're laughing at me again," said the girl sadly.

"'Tis solemn earnest. Listen. Ask yourself, in the time we've been
together here, have we ever exchanged a single kiss, a single touch,
with any thought of passion?"

"Passion?" The girl's eyes looked frankly into his.

"Yes.... It might have been, you know. I am passionate by nature, but
when I look at you, it cools and dies. I am telling you the truth when
I say you have been like a healing, cooling draught to one in a fever.
And I believe you have changed me altogether, now and for ever after."

"I don't think I understand--not all of it. But have you really been
so happy?"

"So unspeakably happy. Yes. And glad to feel myself strong and
self-restrained. I have often thought that no one could ever dream
what happiness and beauty can live in one little grey village. Do you
know what I think? I believe that in every little grey village there
is a quiet, secret happiness, that no one knows."

"Not everywhere, Olof. It is not everywhere there is anyone like you."

"But you! I don't mean to say, of course, it should be just like ours.
But a happiness...."

He drew the girl to him, and their lips met in a long, gentle kiss.

"Can everyone kiss like you?" she whispered shyly, with a tender gleam
in her eyes.

"Maybe. I don't know."

"No, no--there's no one in the world like you. None that can talk like
you, or kiss like you. Do