edge of
realities past and present, he had seen almost at once that, even if
the news were unwelcome, he must not let his wife live in ignorance
that she was still bound. It was only after hearing from Severne of
Barbara's marriage to d'Arcy, that he had said, "John Denin is dead and
buried, and his ghost laid." He had meant to make the supreme sacrifice
for Barbara's good, and there had been no shadow of doubt in his mind
that he was right in making it. Now he asked himself if even then it
might not have been best to let the truth come out. No one was to blame
for the mistake in a dead man's identity, nor for what had happened
afterwards through that mistake. Barbara would have had a hard choice
before her; yet she might, if she possessed strength and courage
enough, have chosen from the two men who had come into her life, the
one she loved. The whole world would have rung with the tragic story,
but at the end Barbara might have lived down the tragedy. If he had
been her choice, he would have helped her to live it down, by the gift
of such love as no man had ever given to a woman.

As it was, he had dared to play the potter. He had taken the clay of
Barbara's destiny into his own awkward hands, to shape it as he thought
best, and he had let the vase break in the furnace. He could never make
it what, but for his meddling, it might have been; yet he must piece
the delicate fragments together if he could, not caring for--not
thinking of--his bleeding hands.

This, then, was the debt Denin owed to Barbara. And to pay it he saw
that he must begin by remaking himself, before he could give her
anything worth the having. He must become a thing of value, in order to
be of value to her. Those faint whispers and snatches of music from the
other side of the hidden river, which he had jumbled into "The War
Wedding," confusedly, hurriedly, fearing to lose their echoes, he must
now carefully gather up again and sort out with method. He must dip
into his brain where half-remembered thoughts seethed in solution. He
must see the rainbow in every tear drop, and crystallize it into a
jewel for Barbara. Thus developing himself, he might have some worthy
offering for her at last.

He could not write that day, nor the next, for it seemed that the only
things worth saying were the things which would not let themselves be
said, things which swept through the background of his mind like a
flight of chiming bells in the night, elusive as wait