ible," he cried roughly, "you must leave your husband and
come with me. You cannot put me off any longer. I am desperate."

He was looking at her with eyes no longer full of pleading, but of
determination and command.

"What will you do?" he asked.

"Oh!" she answered, trembling, "why will you compel me to act? Let
something happen! Wait! It is not necessary always to act! Sometimes it
is better to sit still! We are in God's hands. Let us trust Him. Has He
not awakened this love in our hearts? He has not made us love and long
for each other only to thwart us!"

"Thwart us! Who coaxes the flowers from the ground, only that the frost
may nip them? Who opens the bud only to permit it to be devoured by the
worm? Who places the babe in its mother's arms only to let it be
snatched away by the hand of death? You cannot appeal to me in that
way," he retorted, bitterly.

"Do not speak so," she exclaimed with genuine terror. "It is wicked to
say such things in this quiet and holy place. Oh! why have you lost that
faith you once possessed? What has blinded your eyes to the light that
you taught me to see? I see it now! All will be well! Something says to
me in my heart, 'All will be well,' if we only follow the light!"

Nothing could have given stronger proof that inspiration and intuition
are as natural and legitimate functions of the spiritual nature as
sensation and sense perception are of the physical, than her words and
looks. They would have convinced and mastered him, except for the
self-denial which they demanded of his love! But he was now far past all
reason.

"Pepeeta," he cried, approaching her, "you must be mine and mine alone!
I can no longer endure the thought of your being the wife of another
man. You must come with me. I will not take 'no' for an answer. I
command you to leave this man and go with me. It is a worse crime for
you to live with him when you hate him than to leave him! Come, let us
go! I have money! There are horses to be had. He does not know where we
are. Let us fly!"

It was evident that he had brooked her refusal as long as he could. The
man was mad. He seized her by the arm.

In a single instant this gentle creature passed through an incredible
transformation. She wrenched her arm from his hand and stood before him
fearless, resolute, magnificent! Her gypsy training stood her in good
stead now. Young as she was when a pupil in that hard school, she had
learned from her wild teachers th