In the darkening room the firelight leaped and showed to Father Honore the woman's face transfigured under the powerful influence of his words. She smiled up at him--a smile so brave in its pathos, so winning in its true womanliness, that Father Honore felt the tears bite his eyeballs. "Perhaps I don't need to go then." "This rejoices me, Aileen--it will rejoice us all," he answered heartily to cover his emotion. "But it won't be easy to stay where I am." "I know--I know; you speak as one who has suffered; but has not Champney suffered too? Think of his home-coming!" "Yes, he has suffered--in a way--but not my way." Father Honore had a vision at that moment of Champney Googe's face when he said, "But you loved her with your whole manhood." He made no reply, but waited for Aileen to say more if she should so choose. "I believed he loved me--and so I told him my love--I shall never, never get over that!" she exclaimed passionately. "But I know now--I knew before he went away the last time, that I was mistaken; no man could say what he did and know even the first letter of love." Her indignation was rising, and Father Honore welcomed it; it was a natural trait with her, and its suppression gave him more cause for anxiety than its expression. "He didn't love me--not really--" "Are you sure of this, Aileen?" "Yes, I am sure." "You have good reason to know that you are telling a fact in asserting this?" "Yes, altogether too good a reason." There was a return of bitterness in her answer. Father Honore was baffled. Aileen spoke without further questioning. Evidently she was desirous of making her position as well as Champney's plain to him and to herself. Her voice grew more gentle as she continued:-- "Father Honore, I've loved him so long--and so truly, without hope, you know--never any hope, and hating myself for loving where I was not loved--that I think I do know what love is--" Father Honore smiled to himself in the half-dark; this voice was still young, and its love-wisdom was young-wise, also. There was hope, he told himself, that all would come right in the end--work together for good. "But Mr. Googe never loved me as I loved him--and I couldn't accept less." The priest caught but the lesser part of her meaning. Even his wisdom and years failed to throw light on the devious path of Aileen's thoughts at this moment. Of the truth contained in her expression, he had no inkling. "Aileen, I don't know that I can make it plain to you, but--a man's love is so different from a woman's that, sometimes, I think such a statement as you have just made is so full of flaws that it amounts to sophistry; but there is no need to discuss that.--Let me ask you if you can endure to stay on with Mrs. Champney for a few months longer? I have a very special reason for asking this. Sometime I will tell you."