She held it, gazing spellbound into it. And suddenly she saw a cottage bedroom, and a girl kneeling there--a pretty girl, with flaxen hair and a sad, thoughtful face. And again, the long vistas of the Temple--the heavy curtains drawn, revealing the same figure kneeling before the Serpent. And then again, the same girl in a garden surrounded by the loveliest brilliant flowers, with a look of eagerness and expectation on her face that Marigold somehow felt she understood. And then instantaneously a blight had settled on the garden--the flowers shrivelled and dead; but this as nothing to the human face, white and paralysed of every feeling except despair and pain. And then a deep-red glow, a palace garden, terraced and ornamented, a chariot and horses, and two figures just for the instant--and one was the Master, and the other the girl, who came and went all through. “Rosalie.” The word slipped from Marigold’s lips, and then again was silence. And then the image of the Serpent melted within the pure white fires of Heaven. Pure and intense--the real curtain that divides man from God. And it seemed as if the crystal seethed and burned within this holy light a long time; and though there came no forms or scenes with it, it was to Marigold the most glorious scene of all, for she had felt and understood that fire--so cruel, yet, to the strong, so kindly. And then at last another garden, with long lawns and blossoming bowers. And this time a little girl, playing alone, the sun having dyed her hair a pretty golden. And then Marigold looked a little while, and at last she put the crystal down, and she said: “It’s me.” And when the ordinary light came back to the room again, she looked around with a new interest and a heightened colour, and she rubbed her eyes. “I don’t understand a bit,” she said. “Neither did I,” he answered, smiling. “At least, not when you played the beggar girl. That was rather an expensive whim of yours, Marigold. Had I met you as the Lady of Ellel, I should have been prepared for you, and all would have been smooth sailing from the first. But when you’re looking for a Princess with a pair of lovely eyes, with an expression in them you have learnt to love and know through all the changes of eternity, and suddenly a beggar girl appears in rags, with just the same expression, you are allowed surely to feel--well, some annoyance.” And Marigold laughed and clapped her hands. “Oh! you are dull and stupid,” she cried gaily, shaking his arm and almost dancing with delight. “Don’t you see, I--I couldn’t have done anything better? I--I never knew what pain and suffering were till I became the beggar girl.” “You’d learnt it all before.” “Ah! was I--was I--am I--Rosalie?” “Did you not remember the scenes?” “Ye-es--ye-es. I don’t understand it. I can only feel. But there _must_ be a Rosalie, besides myself, because I was so horribly jealous of her. You know I was.” “I know. That proves how reasonless jealousy can be.”