"Will it hurt you to leave me tonight?" she whispered. "Yes." She touched his sleeve. "I don't like you to be hurt, yet I like that. Will you come next Sunday?" "Not if you're afraid. I can't come to see you if you won't let me say things." "I'll try not to be afraid; only, only, say them very softly so that nothing else can hear." He laughed and caught her hand and kissed it. "I shall do exactly what I like," he said; but as he strode away without another word he knew from something in the way she stood and looked at him, something of patience and resolve, that their future was not in his hands alone. When he was out of sight and hearing, Helen moved stiffly, as though she waked from a long sleep and was uncertain where she was. The familiar light shone in the kitchen of Brent Farm, yet the house seemed unreal and remote, marooned in the high heather. The heather was thick and rich that year, and the flowers touched her hands. The smell of honey was heavy in the air, and thousands of small, pale moths made a honey-coloured cloud between the purple moor and the night blue of the sky. If she strained her ears, Helen could hear the singing of Halkett's stream and it said things she had not heard before. A sound of voices came from the road and she knew that some faithful Christians of the moor were returning from their worship in the town: she remembered them crude and ugly in their Sunday clothes, but they gathered mystery from distance and the night. Perhaps they came from that chapel where Zebedee had spent his unhappy hours. She turned and her hands swept the heather flowers. This was now his praying place, as it had always been hers, and when the Easter fires came again they would pray to them together. At the garden door her hand fell from the latch and she faced the moor. She lifted her arms and dropped them in a kind of pleading for mercy from those whom she had served faithfully; then she smoothed her face and went into the house. In the drawing-room, Mildred Caniper was sitting on the sofa, and near her John and Lily had disposed themselves like guests. Helen stopped in the doorway. "Then the light in your house meant nothing," she said reproachfully. "What should it mean?" John asked. "Happiness and peace--somewhere," she said. "It does mean that," and turning to Lily, he asked, "Doesn't it?" "Yes, yes, but don't brag about it." They laughed together, and they sat with an alert tranquillity of health which made Mildred Caniper look very small and frail. She was listening courteously to the simple things John told her about animals and crops and butter-sales, but Helen knew that she was almost too tired to understand, and she felt trouble sweeping over her own happiness. To hide that trouble, she asked quickly, "Where are the others?" and an invisible Rupert answered her. "You're the last in." He sat outside the window, and as she approached, he added, "And I hope you have had a happy time."