Her hand quivered in his. A feeling of revulsion smothered the gentleness of their mood. His words had struck her as a reproach. Fulfillment of duty! That was the great law to which all human kind was subject for the sake of God. This law had joined her hand to his, had accompanied her into the chastity of her bridal bed, and had kept its vigil through the years by her hearth and in her heart. And thus love itself had not been difficult to her, for it was commanded to her and consecrated before the face of God. And he? He wished for nothing more, knew nothing more. Indeed, what lies beyond duty would probably have seemed burdensome to him, if not actually sinful. But there was something more! She knew it now. She had seen it in that glance, moist with yearning, lost in the light. There was something great and ecstatic and all-powerful, something before which she quailed like a child who must go into the dark, something that she desired with every nerve and fibre. Her eye fastened itself upon the purple square of blotting paper which looked, in the light of the lamp, like glowing metal. She did not know how long she had sat there. It might have been minutes or hours. Often enough the morning had caught her brooding thus. The sick man's breath came with greater difficulty, his fingers grasped hers more tightly. "Do you feel worse?" she asked. "I am a little afraid," he said; "therefore, read me----" He stopped, for he felt the quiver of her hand. "You know, if you don't want to--" He was wounded in his wretched valetudinarian egotism, which was constantly on the scent of neglect. "Oh, but I do want to; I want to do everything that might----" She hurried to the table, pushed the glittering bottles aside, grasped the hymnal and read at random. But she had to stop, for it was a prayer for rain that she had begun. Then, as she was turning the leaves of the book, she heard the hall door of the next room open with infinite caution; she heard flying, trembling footsteps cross the room from the balcony. _"Chut!"_ whispered a trembling voice. And the door closed as with a weary moan. What was that? A suspicion arose in her that brought the scarlet of shame into her cheek. The whispering next door began anew, passionate, hasty, half-smothered by anxiety and delight. Two voices were to be distinguished: a lighter voice which she knew, and a duller voice, broken into, now and then, by sonorous tones. The letters dislimned before her eyes. The hymn-book slipped from her hands. In utter confusion she stared toward the door. _That_ really existed? Such things were possible in the world; possible among people garbed in distinction, of careful Christian training, to whom one looks up as to superior beings?