What she had believed to be the tremendous force of her spirit had been as one grain of sand against the tides of ocean. What was one to think of it all then--of human love which believed itself created for eternity, of dreams which one's soul persuaded one would come true, of aspirations born in a hallucination of power, of that spark within one which played one false, of believing one could master fate only to find one had erected a child's house upon the sands, and that what had been achieved in consciousness of great power could be swept away so easily that the ocean was not even conscious of having taken it unto itself? Very sternly, very understandingly, their lives swept before her anew.... Just one little wave from the tide of fate had lapped up, unknowingly, uncaringly, that house upon the sand which a delusion of the spirit had made seem a castle grounded in eternity. Why blind one's self to the truth and call life fair? For what had they fought and suffered and believed and hoped? Just to hear the mocking voice of the outgoing tide? The fury of the sea was creeping into her blood. Rage possessed her. All of her spirit, mightier than ever before, went out to meet the spirit of the sea--hating it, defying it, understanding its own futility, and the more hot from the sense of impotence. That died to desolation. She had never been so wholly desolate--the sea so mighty, she so powerless. Fate and human souls were like that. Karl--where was he? Swept out by the ocean of fate. To what shore had he been carried? What thought he of the tide which had carried him out from her? Was his soul, like hers, spending itself in the passion of rebellion--so mighty as to shake the foundations of one's being, so futile as to prevail against not one drop of water in that sea of fate? Time passed; the tide was still coming in, nearing its height. But to the sea there had come a change. The spirit of it seemed different. For a long time she sat there dimly conscious of a difference, and then it seemed as though the sea were trying to reach her with something it had to bring. She tried to shake herself free from so strange a fancy, but it held her, and for a long time she sat there motionless, looking out at the sea with all her eyes, reaching out to it with all her soul, becoming more and more still,--a hush upon her whole being,--moved, held, unreasoningly expectant. The sea seemed trying to make her ready. Each wave which beat upon the rocks beat against her consciousness, driving against her mood and spirit, as if clearing a way, making her ready, open, to what would come. It seemed finally to have cleared her whole being, driven away all which might impede. It seemed now as though she could take in things not seen or heard. There was that strange openness of the spirit, that hush, that unreasoning expectancy.