in," she answered. "I feel as if we
could see the whole island from there. And up there we shall get all the
wind of the morning."

They turned towards the steep, bare slope and climbed it, while the sun
rose higher, as if attending them. At the summit there was a heap of
stones.

"Let us sit here," Hermione said. "We can see everything from here, all
the glories of the dawn."

"Yes."

He was so intensely preoccupied by the debate within him that he did not
remember that it was here, among these stones where they were sitting,
that he had hidden the fragments of Hermione's letter from Africa telling
him of her return on the day of the fair.

They sat down with their faces towards the sea. The air up here was
exquisitely cool. In the pellucid clearness of dawn the coast-line looked
enchanted, fairy-like and full of delicate mystery. And its fading, in
the far distance, was like a calling voice. Behind them the ranges of
mountains held a few filmy white clouds, like laces, about their rugged
peaks. The sea was a pale blue stillness, shot with soft grays and mauves
and pinks, and dotted here and there with black specks that were the
boats of fishermen.

Hermione sat with her hands clasped round her knees. Her face, browned by
the African sun, was intense with feeling.

"Yes," she said, at last, "I can tell you here."

She looked at the sea, the coast-line, then turned her head and gazed at
the mountains.

"We looked at them together," she continued--"that last evening before I
went away. Do you remember, Maurice?"

"Yes."

"From the arch. It is better up here. Always, when I am very happy or
very sad, my instinct would be to seek a mountain-top. The sight of great
spaces seen from a height teaches one, I think."

"What?"

"Not to be an egoist in one's joy; not to be a craven in one's sorrow.
You see, a great view suggests the world, the vastness of things, the
multiplicity of life. I think that must be it. And of course it reminds
one, too, that one will soon be going away."

"Going away?"

"Yes. 'The mountains will endure'--but we--!"

"Oh, you mean death."

"Yes. What is it makes one think most of death when--when life, new life,
is very near?"

She had been gazing at the mountains and the sea, but now she turned and
looked into his face.

"Don't you understand what I have to tell you?" she asked.

He shook his head. He was still wondering whether he would dare to tell
her of his sin. And he