"I shall succeed," he cried, in a voice which defied the winds. "Madeleine, you have made me strong. Listen, sweet. I have a home in Virginia, most fair, they say, of England's colonies, and I come to take you there. I have a house in a garden where the sun never sets, and where a river runs gently to the sea between banks of flowers. There is no hard winter or rough wind there, neither enemy nor noise of battle to terrify your dear heart. There the potato grows, and the white tobacco blooms scent the night, and there the voice of Nature sings of peace. Will come with me, sweet?" "You have learnt your lesson," she sighed, content. Misty rain smote them, but they strained at each other and laughed at it. The cold numbed their feet, but their hearts were so warm that they did not heed it. Nature thundered at them, but the roar of menace became a triumphal march, and the shriek of the fiends a benediction. "This one day you shall spare to me," said Madeleine. "Let us spend it as a day to be remembered. I have a cave down yonder, around which I have trailed the bushes and taught ivy to grow. There we will build a fire and I will be your housewife. Come! let us run along the wind." He bent to assist her, and she feigned to be stiff with cold, the lovely traitor, so that she might feel his arms about her. Hand in hand they ran, the rain and wind driven upon their backs, the angry sky lowering upon the two who thus dared to endure the perils of life so happily. But the lovers knew that behind the damp gloom and the storm smiled the kindly sun; and they knew that he would conquer in good time. So that happy day drew to its end in mist and rain, and the wind died down, and the storm clouds went out of the sky one by one. The moon broke wanly into light and a pale star of hope gazed serenely down. Nature wearied of her tumult, and old Æolus drove the turbulent north wind back into its cave and set his seal upon the mouth. Geoffrey and Madeleine stood struggling to part. There was no tear in the violet eyes of brave beauty as she looked up smiling, dwelling always upon the future to sweeten the bitterness of the present. "Love must be tested," she murmured with her radiant philosophy. "Hearts must be tried. Geoffrey, I love you." "Madeleine, I love you." She stood alone, swaying weakly, her face as pale as the moon. Then she laughed to drown the beating of her heart, threw out her hands, and ran breathlessly up the hill where the ragged pines merely nodded, and down into the plain towards the grove, crying to the solitude: "Life is glorious--glorious!" CHAPTER XVI. CLAIRVOYANCE.