It looked as if the whisper burned her cheek. She turned red to the roots of her yellow hair. She could not look at me. "Sir Knight," she said at last, "in the world we do not ask such things." So I knew. As to my manner, I think I have obeyed her. At least, I have been silent. But if this is to be my portion, death must come soon. For all my body is under the sway of this great trouble. I cannot eat. My hands seem helpless, they are so cold. My throat is choked. When have I slept? I think my father knows, and, though I cannot speak to him, understands, if a man for whom life is over can ever understand one at the beginning. Yet how can he? how can he? For my mother loved him, and gave herself to him. There is in all the world no sorrow like this of mine. To stand by and see another man help her into the boat and row away! To see him pin a flower in her hair with those daring hands! And I would have died to do it. Yet last night, as I stormed through the forest like the north wind that hates the clinging leaves, blind in the darkness, blind from within,--and only through some forest instinct keeping myself from crashing into tree and bush,--a moment of calm enwrapped me as quickly as if a gossamer veil had fallen from above. I seemed to see the meaning of things, the true meaning and value. That he should give her a flower, should take her hand, should win her smile--nay, the touch of her cheek, her lips--words I can scarcely write, even here,--what are these perishable gifts? Gauds of time! Did some poet say that, or have I made the phrase? The foolish broidery on the web of life, to wear and wear with years! But what lies behind to engender the token--ah, that is the eternal! I cannot penetrate her heart to see the living thoughts that thus denote themselves; but I know my own. I challenge time itself to match them with a brood more great. My love, my faith in her, my sacrifice, these are giants, springing into sudden Titanic birth, and Homer's heroes are pygmies to them. So the night calmed me, and I thanked God (did I ever write that word before? Did I ever really think it?) that my soul was born. But in the morning the mood had passed. I knew still what I had learned, but I could not feel it. My father, my dear father! He sits all day with Homer open on his knee, and does not read. Once after the others had been here, and he saw me wince when she and the man went laughing off together, he said to me, almost as if he were afraid to say it:-- "Don't overestimate the little familiarities of social life." He said it, but I could not answer. [Sidenote: _Zoe Montrose to Francis Hume_]