d where in
the corners taps drip upon drain-stones. Our immense--our naked
solitude pervades us. An exquisite emotion takes hold of me while we
are slowly climbing the steep and methodical way. There is something
human in the stairway; in the inevitable shapes of its spiral and its
steps cut out of the quick, in the rhythmic repetition of its steps. A
round skylight pierces the sloping roof up there, and it is the only
light for this part of the people's house, this poor internal city.
The darkness which runs down the walls of the well, whence we are
striving to emerge step by step, conceals our laborious climb towards
that gap of daylight. Shadowed and secret as we are, it seems to me
that we are mounting to heaven.

Oppressed by a common languor, we at last sat down side by side on a
step. There is no sound in the building under the one round window
bending over us. We lean on each other because of the stair's
narrowness. Her warmth enters into me; I feel myself agitated by that
obscure light which radiates from her. I share with her the heat of
her body and her thought itself. The darkness deepens round us.
Hardly can I see the crouching girl there, warm and hollowed like a
nest.

I call her by her name, very quietly, and it is as though I made a loud
avowal! She turns, and it seems that this is the first time I have
seen her naked face. "Kiss me," she says; and without speaking we
stammer, and murmur, and laugh.

* * * * * *

Together we are looking at a little square piece of paper. I found it
on the seat which the rose-tree overhangs on the edge of the downward
lane. Carefully folded, it had a forgotten look, and it was waiting
there, detained for a moment by its timorous weight. A few lines of
careful writing cover it. We read it:

"I do not know how speaks the pious heart; nothing I know; th'
enraptured martyr I. Only I know the tears that brimming start, your
beauty blended with your smile to espy."

Then, having read it, we read it again, moved by a mysterious
influence. And we finger the chance-captured paper, without knowing
what it is, without understanding very well what it says.

* * * * * *

When I asked her to go with me to the cemetery that Sunday, she agreed,
as she does to all I ask her. I watched her arms brush the roses as
she came in through the gardens. We walked in silence; more and more
we