“That my daughter, Gabrielle, should be white to all eternity! All that I have, and all that I am, will I give, ... yea, for this would I give my soul.” Satan smiled. “Then lay down your burden, my daughter; you shall have your heart’s desire!” Margot, with a sobbing cry, laid down her life’s unbearable burden at the feet of the Prince of the Powers of Darkness. By his eternal damnation he swore she should have her heart’s desire; by her rejected salvation she swore to abide by the covenant. “_Consummatum est!_” he said, and was gone on the black blast. The candles sent up a thin flare of flame and smoke, and went out in utter darkness. Crouched on the floor against the wall Margot still knelt in a stupor. A rat came out of a hole in the wall and gnawed at her rosary. Dawn came in at the windows; the twilit gray grew pink. The walls were blotched and spotted; everything exhaled an odor of mildew; Margot still huddled upon the floor beneath the crucifix; over her head the crucified Christ hung mute in His agony. * * * * * The flight of hours, the decline of day, the season’s turn, all things which preface change are presages of parting, and, like the proximity of the tomb, though wreathed in bloomy myrtle, are subtly fraught with sadness and regret. All love’s farewells are so oppressed. Though with absolute confidence in themselves and in each other, sure of the imperishable structure of their love, a nameless apprehension fills the hearts of all who part, and casts a melancholy shade on partings. “Until to-morrow!” Ah, to-morrow! “To-morrow I will come again!” she says. They go, with trembling hands, each, shaken by departure, saying, “Shall we meet again?” “To-morrow!” Gabrielle had said, as she took her lips away. “To-morrow I will come again!” and was gone. In the warm heart of the midsummer night he dreamed again among the hedges, a boy’s dream, a dream of joy, a dream of heart’s delight. Her lips were pomegranate blossoms; her cheeks were wild peach flowers; it was a boy’s dream, a dream of joy, a dream of heart’s delight! Her waist was as a willow-withe, her voice a bird in the deep wood calling; her feet danced fantasies in his heart. He came all in the daze of a boy’s dream, a dream of joy, a dream of heart’s desire. With every eager breath he drew in the hyacinthine fragrance of the night.