around her, she could not shrink very far away,--nor was
it seen that she tried to,--but all at once her words came in uneven
rushes: "How can I hold anger against you when, with every breath,
my lips sigh for your kisses? Yet let no one wonder at it that I am
frightened... You cannot conceive what a lurking place for terrors the
world looks to me! Never, I think, shall I see men sitting together that
I shall not suspect them of having murder in their hearts. Never shall I
see two friends clasp hands but my mind will run forward to a time when
they shall part in wrath and loneliness. Nay, even of the sound of my
own voice I am afraid, lest whomsoever is hearing it--for all that he
speak me fair--be twisting the words in his mind into evils I have not
dreamed of. Sebert, I do not reproach you with it! I think it all the
fault of my own blunders,--and therein I find a new terror. That one
should suffer for wrong-doing is to be looked for, but if one is to be
dealt with so unsparingly only for making mistakes, who knows where his
position is or what to expect? Oh, my best friend, make me brave or I
am likely to die only through fearing to live! With my ignorance my
boldness went from me, until now my courage is lowly as a willow
leaf. Love, make me brave again!" Trusting, in her very declaration of
distrust, she clung to him to save her from herself.

It was in the briar-pricked fingers, which he was pressing against his
cheek, that he found his answer. Suddenly he spread them out in his
palm before her, laughing with joyful lightness. "Randalin, the thorns
wounded your hands the while that you stripped yonder hedge, but did you
stop for that? If I can prove to you that all these dark days you have
been but plucking roses, can you not bravely bear with the pricks?"

Putting her gently from him, he gathered up the spoils she had let fall,
picking from among them with great care the fairest of either kind,
while she, catching his mood, watched him April-faced. "This," he said
gaily, "is the red rose of my heart. Battle-fields lay between us and
tower walls, and the way was long and hard to find, yet can you deny, my
elf, that you came in and plucked it and wore it away in your hair,--to
keep or to cast aside as pleased you?"

Smiles and tears growing together, she caught the blossom from him and
pressed it to her lips. "I will wear it in my bosom," she answered, "for
my breast has been empty--since the day I saw you first.