He felt a vague surprise in himself that he caught the drift so readily. ‘At the barefooted woman’s--’ he finished. ‘Yes--’ ‘It was different, after supper that night,’ she went on, ‘but I’m glad I would have known you, as you are to-day. Reading the papers was so confusing.’ ‘They never know when to stop.’ ‘They didn’t tell it nearly all, either--’ ‘What do you mean?’ ‘Oh, I wouldn’t have known it was the same story by reading it in the papers.’ ‘I see--’ She was changed--less glitter somehow, as if her light came from deeper in, a light more delicate. She had on a creamy dress, no folds in it, but not tight anywhere. This meeting wasn’t like the first time in the Señora’s house; nor yet, was it like the sense of her which had come in the hospital, from so many hours of pondering over the separate sentences of her letter. Suddenly he knew he must never tie himself to any particular moment when with her, because she wasn’t going to be the same the next time. Tying to one meeting would keep him from catching on to all that the next held in store. His mind clung for a moment, however, to the memory of the alabaster bowl at home, while she was still going on about the newspapers. ‘They didn’t see you. They didn’t know what we did--what we tried to do. They sort of laughed at us, and talked of your great bravery, but there was something no one saw--’ She was standing at his left--a hush between the sentences. ‘... They didn’t know that somebody was helping us--’ ‘What do you mean?’ ‘I mean it wasn’t just your strength. Why, you were like one dead; and yet you still drove. It was only when we were safe that your hand relaxed--’ ‘A case of knowing I had to, wasn’t it?’ ‘More than that. That helped, of course, but there was something more--’ He said: ‘I didn’t know much of what was happening at the time--that is, to remember, but I had a feeling you were helping--’ ‘Did you know that?’ ‘Yes.’ ‘Really, did you know that?’ ‘I had the feeling you were helping,’ he repeated. ‘First I thought your hand--you know, I thought your hand would come up and help--’ ‘It couldn’t.’ ‘I didn’t know then.’ ‘It was because it couldn’t, don’t you see?’ ‘No. I don’t understand.’ ‘When I found I couldn’t lift my hand, I knew I had to help another way!’ ‘You mean you--you prayed?’ ‘I never did before,’ she laughed. ‘Yes, it was like that--’ It was as if the windows were all thrust open into a wide silent summer, like the stillness of mountains, where there is not even the rustle of a wing. A clean perfume came in, and there was a clear seeing in Elbert’s brain, as if an arc-light were burning, where only candles had shone before. ‘It was so dreadful, because I had promised,’ she said. ‘How was that?’ ‘You had asked me to help you, and I had promised. Then I found I could not even lift my hand. It was then I kept saying, “I have to help him, please. I have to help him, please--”’ ‘I see,’ said Elbert.