th their sound and revelling almost in the unreality of the
happiness they brought. More and more she despised herself as the
intervals between one pang of suffering and the next grew longer, and
the illusion deeper and more like reality.

After all, it was he, and no other. It was the man she loved who was
pouring out his own love into her ears, and smoothing her hair and
pressing the hand he held. Had he not said it once, and more than once?
What matter where, what matter how, provided that he loved? She had
received the fulfilment of her wish. He loved her now. Under another
name, in a vision, with another face and another voice, yet, still, she
was herself.

As in a storm the thunder-claps came crashing through the air, deafening
and appalling at first, then rolling swiftly into a far distance,
fainter and fainter, till all is still and only the plash of the
fast-falling rain is heard, so, as she listened, the tempest of her pain
was passing away. Easier and easier it became to hear herself called
Beatrice, easier and easier it grew to take the other's place, to accept
the kiss, the touch, the word, the pressure of the hand that were all
another's due, and given to herself only for the mask she wore in his
dream.

And the tide of the great temptation rose, and fell a little, and rose
higher again each time, till it washed the fragile feet of the last
good thought that lingered, taking refuge on the highest point above the
waves. On and on it came, receding and coming back, higher and higher,
surer and surer. Had she drawn back in time it would have been so easy.
Had she turned and fled when the first moment of senseless joy was
over, when she could still feel all the shame, and blush for all the
abasement, it would have been over now, and she would have been safe.
But she had learned to look upon the advancing water, and the sound of
it had no more terror for her. It was very high now. Presently it would
climb higher and close above her head.

There were long intervals of silence now. The first rush of his speech
had spent itself, for he had told her much and she had heard it all,
even through the mists of her changing moods. And now that he was silent
she longed to hear him speak again. She could never weary of that voice.
It had been music to her in the days when it had been full of cold
indifference--now each vibration roused high harmonies in her heart,
each note was a full chord, and all the chords made but