"That’s all. I learned a great deal last night." "You say that a day or two would make no difference, and yet this morning you were up very early. You ordered the camels—" "I thought only of myself." "You thought it would be easier to go to-day—though the camels needed rest—" "I could not hold it in the night that the meeting meant anything to you." "You were out on the quest and I appeared in the way—" she smiled and added, "a dragon to be overcome." "I have not imagination enough to make you that—" "A dragon to test the courage of the quester. A man must never forget his mission—must remember first of all the little ones, the many little ones, who require a sign." In spite of the tearing-down, it was a pinnacle moment to Romney. She was lovely as he had not seen her before. Her swift and absolute understanding liberated his whole nature upon her. Had she chosen to captivate him, there could not have been conceived a more perfect design. Had she met him level-eyed, weakness for weakness, it would have sounded, temporarily, at least, the knell for his infatuation. Had she clung or pressed him to linger, it would have become a mere episode. He arose, his lips smiling, his eyes burning with tributes to her—moved about the table, placed his hands upon her shoulders and bent his lips to hers. "Won’t you come with me?" he whispered.... "We will go to the Temple together. We will bring forth a sign to the people." ... Her fingers closed gently upon his wrists, lifting his hands outward from her shoulders and letting them fall. Then she arose and looked at him tenderly. "You are dear—I think you could not be so dear if you were not bewildered. These meetings are wonderful, but don’t you see—that you are dreaming? Don’t you see that a man must travel alone on his quest? It’s like the old stories—he must slay the dragon that stands between. A man does not take a woman to the Inner Temple. A man who passes the threshold of the Inner Temple cannot have a woman in his eyes or heart. They would say, ’Why, this is a mere mortal. He cannot enter here.’ Do you not see, do you not see?" "Anna Erivan." She smiled and put down his hands that lifted to her. "You are the quest," he said intensely. "It was our meeting. The Gobi—why, it was but a means of bringing me to you. Last night, as I stood in the court, I knew that. Today, when in a sentence you made all the meanings of my life clear, taking up my story and completing it briefly—today, just now, I saw that I could never look beyond you—" "Don’t say that. I should not have let you say that. We are asked to renounce nothing that lasts. You must not fail through me. This is not a good beginning for our story. You know this. You are only bewildered."