had
been powerless to hurt them. It must be true what Chiltern had said that
the world was changing. The tragic and the ridiculous here joining hands,
she remembered that Reggie Farwell had told her that he had recently made
a trip to western New York to inspect a house he had built for a
"remarried" couple who were not wholly unknown. The dove-cote, he had
called it. The man, in his former marriage, had been renowned all up and
down tidewater as a rake and a brute, and now it was an exception when he
did not have at least one baby on his knee. And he knew, according to Mr.
Farwell, more about infant diet than the whole staff of a maternity
hospital.

At length, as she stared into the darkness, dissolution came upon it. The
sills of her windows outlined themselves, and a blurred foliage was
sketched into the frame. With a problem but half solved the day had
surprised her. She marvelled to see that it grew apace, and presently
arose to look out upon a stillness like that of eternity: in the grey
light the very leaves seemed to be holding their breath in expectancy of
the thing that was to come. Presently the drooping roses raised their
heads, from pearl to silver grew the light, and comparison ended. The
reds were aflame, the greens resplendent, the lawn sewn with the diamonds
of the dew.

A little travelling table was beside the window, and Honora took her pen
and wrote.

"My dearest, above all created things I love you. Morning has come,
and it seems to me that I have travelled far since last I saw you.
I have come to a new place, which is neither hell nor heaven, and in
the mystery of it you--you alone are real. It is to your strength
that I cling, and I know that you will not fail me.

"Since I saw you, Hugh, I have been through the Valley of the
Shadow. I have thought of many things. One truth alone is clear--
that I love you transcendently.. You have touched and awakened me
into life. I walk in a world unknown.

"There is the glory of martyrdom in this message I send you now.
You must not come to me again until I send for you. I cannot, I
will not trust myself or you. I will keep this love which has come
to me undefiled. It has brought with it to me a new spirit, a
spirit with a scorn for things base and mean. Though it were my
last chance in life, I would not see you if you came. If I thought
you would not understand what I feel, I could not love you as I do.