le were breathing softly, and the moon
shone over the sheepfold like a shepherd's lantern, her love had grown
wilful, and she had liked to say that she would go away with him. She
knew not whether she could fulfil her promise, but it had been a joy to
give it. They had walked slowly towards Dulwich, the groom had brought
round the dog-cart; Owen had asked her once more to get in. Oh, to drive
away with him through the night! "Owen, it is impossible," she said; "I
cannot, at least not now. But I will one day very soon, sooner perhaps
than you think."

He had driven away, and, standing on the moon-whitened road, she had
watched the white dust whirl about the wheels.

One of the difficulties in the indulgence of these voluptuous
meditations was that they necessitated the omission of her evening
prayers. She could not kneel by her bedside and pray to God to deliver
her from evil, all the while nourishing in her heart the intention of
abandoning herself to the thought of Owen the moment she got into bed.
Nor did the omission of her evening prayers quite solve the difficulty,
for when she could think no more of Owen, the fear of God returned. She
dared not go to sleep, and lay terrified, dreading the devil in every
corner of the room. Lest she might die in her sleep and be summoned
before the judgment seat, she lay awake as long as she could.

When she fell asleep she dreamed of the stage when the world was won,
and when it seemed she had only to stretch her hands to the sky to take
the stars. But in the midst of her triumph she perceived that she could
no longer sing the music the world required; a new music was drumming in
her ears, drowning the old music, a music written in a melancholy mode,
and played on invisible harps. Owen told her it was madness to listen,
and she strove to close her ears against it. In great trouble of mind
she awoke; it was only a dream, and she had not lost her voice. She lay
back upon the pillow and tried to recall the music which she had heard
on the invisible harps, but already it was forgotten; it faded from her
brain like mist from the surface of a mere. But the humour that the
dream had created endured after the dream was dead. She felt no longer
as she had felt over night, and lay in a sort of obtuse sensibility of
conscience. She got up and dressed, her mind still clouded and sullen,
and her prayers were said in a sort of middle state between fervour and
indifference. Her father attribut