“I wanted my mistress altogether,” the other broke in, “from the first moment to the last--fool, and wicked fool, as you may think me. I could see her bosom stir her gown--I could see the lines of her as she walked. She was kind to me, I tell you, and there were times when--alone with her--in her melting mood--in the wildness of my passion--but no! something held me: I never dared touch her.... And then he--the other--came back; he, with his 'claims' and 'rights'; and the thought of him, and what he could do--and did do--made me blind. You tell me that I sinned against her--” “I don't,” said Senhouse. “I tell you that you sinned against love. You don't know what love is.” “You say so. Maybe you know nothing about it. If you have reduced yourself to be contented with the soul of a woman, I have not. What have I to do with the soul?” “Evidently nothing,” said Senhouse. “How, pray, do you undertake to apprehend body's beauty unless you discern the soul in it--on which it shapes its beauty?” “I know,” the other replied, “that she has a lovely body, and gracious, free-moving ways; and I could have inferred her soul from them. I'll engage that you did the same thing. How are you to judge of the soul but by the hints which the body affords you?” Senhouse made no answer, but remained musing. When he spoke it was as if he was resuming a tale half-told.... “She was in white--white as a cloud--and in a wood. Her hair reflected gold of the sun. She pinned her skirts about her waist, and put her bare foot into a pool of black water. She sank in it to the knee. She did not falter: her eyes were steady upon what she did.” The stranger took him up where he stopped, and continued the tale. “She could never falter in her purpose. She bared herself to the thighs. She went into the pool thigh-deep. Whiter than the lilies which she went to save, she raked the weed from them--you helping her.” “She did,” said Senhouse, his eyes searching the fire. “And when, afterwards, she did what her heart bade her, she never faltered either, though she steeped her pure soul in foulness compared to which the black water was sweet. But do you suppose that any evil handling would stain her? You fool! You are incapable of seeing a good woman. In the same breath with which I spurned myself for having a moment's fear for her, I thanked God for having let me witness her action.” The rebuke was accepted, not because it was felt to be justified; but rather, it passed unheeded. The stranger had questions to ply. “Knowing her, loving her--loveworthy as she was--how could you leave her?” “I beg your pardon,” said Senhouse, “I have never left her.” But in the next breath he had to qualify his paradox.