ach drawing by the veil, each
recognizing the other for what it was. They took their seat upon the
wide stone bench, with the primroses at their feet, and above them the
empurpling arch of the sky. Throughout the past months, when he dreamed
of her, when he thought of her, he bowed himself before her, he raised
not his eyes to hers. But now their looks met, and his countenance of a
haggard and ravaged beauty did not change before her still regard. The
floating silver gauze of her open sleeve lying upon the stone between
them he lightly, with no pressure that she might notice, let rest his
hand upon it. In the act of doing this he wondered at himself, but then
he thought, "I am on my way to death...."

She was the first to speak.

"Seven months have gone since that day at Whitehall."

"Ay," he answered, "seven months."

She went on: "I have learned not to reckon life that way. Since that day
at Whitehall life has lasted a very long time."

Again he echoed--"A very long time." Then, after a pause: "I have made
for you a long, long life. If to have done so is to your irreparable
loss, then this, also, is to be forgiven.... Long life! now in the
watches of one night I live to be an old man! For you may forgetfulness
come at last!"

She turned slightly, looking at him from beneath the gold star. "Wish me
no such happy wishes! Let me not think that such wishes dwell in your
heart. Since that day at Whitehall I have written to you--written twice.
Why did you never answer?"

He looked down upon his clasped hands. "What was there to be said? I
thought, 'I have sorely wounded her whom I love, and with my own words I
have seared that wound as with white heat of iron. Now God keep me man
enough to say no farther word!'"

"I was benumbed that day," she said; "I was frozen. My brother's face
came between us.... Oh, my brother!... Since that day I have seen Sir
John Nevil--"

"Then a just man told you my story justly," he began, but she
interrupted him, her breath coming faster.

"I have also made other inquiry; on my knees, on my face, in the dead of
the night when I knew that thou, too, waked, I have asked of God, and of
our Lord the Christ who suffered.... I know not if they heard me, there
be so many that clamor in their ears...." With a quick movement she
arose from the stone seat and began to pace the grass-plot, her hands
clasped behind her head, the gold star yet bright in the late, late
sunshine. "I would they ha