when Andras's father had been laid in the earth of Attila.

"I would like," said Marsa, when the music had ceased, "to go to the
little village where my mother rests. She was a Tzigana also! Like them,
like me! Can I do so, doctor?"

The doctor shook his head.

"Oh, Princess, not yet! Later, when the warm sun comes."

"Is not that the sun?" said Marsa, pointing to the April rays entering
the old feudal hall and making the bits of dust dance like sparks of
gold.

"It is the April sun, and it is sometimes dangerous for--"

The doctor paused; and, as he did not finish, Marsa said gently, with a
smile which had something more than resignation in it--happiness:

"For the dying?"

Andras shuddered; but Marsa's hand, which held his, did not even tremble.

Old Varhely's eyes were dim with tears.

She knew that she was about to die. She knew it, and smiled at kindly
death. It would take away all shame. Her memory would be to Andras the
sacred one of the woman he adored. She would die without being held to
keep that oath she had made not to survive her dreamed-of happiness, the
union she had desired and accepted. Yes, it was sweet and welcome, this
death, which taking her from Andras's love, washed away all stain.

She whispered in his ear the oft-repeated avowal:

"I love you! I love you! I love you! And I die content, for I feel that
you will love me always. Think a moment! Could I live? Would there not be
a spectre between you and your Marsa?"

She threw her arms about him as he leaned over the couch upon which she
lay, and he made a gesture of denial, unable to speak, for each word
would have been a sob.

"Oh, do not deny it!" she said. "Now, no. But later, who knows? On the
other hand, you see, there will be no other phantom near you but mine, no
other image but mine. I feel that I shall be always near you, yes,
always, eternally, my beloved! Dear death! blessed death! which renders
our love infinite, yes, infinite. Ah, I love you! I love you!"

She wished to see once more, through the open window, the sunny woods and
the new blossoms. Behind those woods, a few leagues away, was the place
where Tisza was buried.

"I should like to rest by her side," said the Tzigana. "I am not of your
family, you see. A princess, I? your wife? I have been only your
sweetheart, my Andras."

Andras, whiter than the dying girl, seemed petrified by the approach of
the inevitable grief.

Now, as they went slowly down the wh