At first he could tell her best in the passionate kiss, the gentle stroking of her face, the tenderness with which his hands rested upon her eyes. And then words added a little. "Everything, liebchen; everything of joy and comfort and beauty and light--light, sweetheart--everything of light and hope and consolation that comes to me now is through you. You've done more than I would have believed in human power. You have actually made me forget, and can you fancy how supreme a thing it is to make a man forget that he is blind? You've put the beautiful things before me in their most beautiful way. Do you suppose that alone, or with any one else, I could see any beauty in anything? You've made me laugh! How did you ever do that--you wonderful little Ernestine? And, sweetheart, you've helped me with my self-respect. You've saved me in a thousand little ways from the humiliations of being blind. Why you actually must have some idea of what it is like yourself!" "I have, Karl. I have imagined and thought about it and tried to--well, just trained myself, until I believe I do know something of what it is like." "You love me!" he murmured, carried with that from despair to exultation. "But if you could only know how _much._" "I do know. I do know, dear. I wish that all the world--I'd hate to have them know, for it's just ours--but for the sake of faltering faith they ought to know what you've been to me this summer." "Then, Karl,"--this after one of their precious silences--"I want to ask you something. It is hard to say it just right, but I'll try. You know that I love you--that we have one of those supreme loves which come at rare times--perhaps for the sake of what you call faltering faith. But, Karl--this will sound hard--but after all, doesn't it fail? Fail of being supreme? Doesn't it fail if it is not--satisfying? I don't mean that it should make up to one for such a thing as being blind, but if in spite of love like ours life seems unbearable to you without your work--why then, dear, doesn't it fail?" He was long in answering, and then he only said, slowly: "I see. I see how you have reasoned it out. I wonder if I can make you understand?" "Ernestine,"--the old enthusiasm had kindled in his face with the summoning of the thoughts--"no painter or sculptor ever loved his work more than I loved mine. And I had that same kind of joy in it; that delight in it as a beautiful thing to achieve. That may seem strange to you. But the working out of something I was able to do brought me the same delight the working out of a picture brings to you. Dear, it was my very soul. And so, instead of there being two forces in my life after I had you, it was just the one big thing. You made me bigger and because I was bigger I wanted to do bigger things. Don't you see that?" She held his hand a little more closely in response. He knew that she understood.