"Yea, Saul," Rachel replied, "I heard both thee and him." (Saul proudly hid an answering hurt of pride.) "I heard thee, brother, and was proud for thee; I never knew more masterful high speech Fall from thy lips. My heart leaped up for joy To listen. When those men of Israel Shouted, I shouted with them, silently, Louder than all. God heard the secret noise, Like thunder, of the beating of my heart In sister's pride for brother's victory. I crowned thee, I anointed thee my king, So glorious wast thou in thy conquering might! And that effulgent pride upon thy brow!" "But when," said Saul, forestalling ruefully The expected and the dreaded change and fall From such a chanted pæan to his praise-- "But when"-- "But when, O Saul," she said, "when he, Stephen, stood forth to answer thee, there was-- Didst thou not feel it?--" "Sister, yea, I felt, More than my sister even could feel, that I Was baffled, put to shame." "Nay, nay," she said; "Not that, O Saul, dear Saul, it was not that." "What, then? For I felt nothing else," said Saul; "That feeling filled me, as sometimes the sound And stir of whirlwind fill the firmament. My mind was one mad vortex swallowing up All other thought than this, 'Saul, thou art shamed!'" "Why, Saul," cried she, "what canst thou mean? Thou shamed? How shamed?" "Rachel, I lost, and Stephen won." "What didst thou lose?" said Rachel, wonderingly; "And what did Stephen win, that also thou Won'st not? I cannot understand thee, Saul." Such crystal clearness of simplicity Became a mirror, wherein gazing, Saul Beheld himself a double-minded man. How should he deal with questioner like this? "Why, Rachel, canst thou then not understand," He said, "how I should wish to conquer?" "Yea," Said she, "for truth's sake, Saul. And still, if truth Conquered, though not by thee, thou wouldst be glad, Wouldst thou not, Saul? Here sad I see thee now, As if truth's cause were fallen--which could not be, Since truth is God's--and yet thou sayest not that, But, 'Saul is shamed!' and, 'Saul has lost!' Not truth, But Saul. I cannot understand. Thou hadst Perhaps, unknown to me, some other end Than only truth, which also thou wouldst gain?" It was his sister's single-heartedness That helped her see so true and aim so fair. Saul was too noble not to meet her trust In him with trust in her as absolute.