omy thoughts, out of pure kindness of heart.

"I am no theologian," he said, "but I fancy that in the long reckoning
the intention goes for more than the act."

"The intention!" she cried, looking back with a start. "If that be
true----"

With a shudder she buried her face in her two hands, pressing them to
her eyes as though to blind them to some awful sight. Then, with a short
struggle, she turned to him again.

"There is no forgiveness for me in Heaven," she said. "Shall there be
none on earth! Not even a little, from you to me?"

"There is no question of forgiveness between you and me. You have not
injured me, but Israel Kafka. Judge for yourself which of us two, he or
I, has anything to forgive. I am to-day what I was yesterday and may be
to-morrow. He lies there, dying of his love for you, if ever a man
died for love. And as though that were not enough, you have tortured
him--well, I will not speak of it. But that is all. I know nothing of
the deeds, or intentions, of which you accuse yourself. You are tired,
overwrought, worn out with all this--what shall I say? It is natural
enough, I suppose--"

"You say there is no question of forgiveness," she said, interrupting
him, but speaking more calmly. "What is it then? What is the real
question? If you have nothing to forgive why can we not be friends as we
were before?"

"There is something besides that needed. It is not enough that of two
people neither should have injured the other. You have broken something,
destroyed something--I cannot mend it. I wish I could."

"You wish you could?" she repeated earnestly.

"I wish that the thing had not been done. I wish that I had not seen
what I saw to-day. We should be where we were this morning--and he
perhaps would not be here."

"It must have come some day," Unorna said. "He must have seen that I
loved--that I loved you. Is there any use in not speaking plainly now?
Then at some other time, in some other place, he would have done what he
did, and I should have been angry and cruel--for it is my nature to
be cruel when I am angry, and to be angry easily, at that. Men talk so
easily of self-control, and self-command and dignity, and self-respect!
They have not loved--that is all. I am not angry now, nor cruel. I
am sorry for what I did, and I would undo it, if deeds were knots and
wishes deeds. I am sorry, beyond all words to tell you. How poor it
sounds now that I have said it! You do not even believe me."