"It is about your book--I could not take it; I have not taken it. I have given it back to you. It is being published now, but--but not in my name!" Oh, if that could have been the whole truth, she thought, as the first thorn of her poor rose of abnegation pierced her. But it was the best that she could do, she told her aching heart pitifully. It was not too late; she could still make it the truth. In that moment of new birth she felt that she must tell him everything, from the first to the last. But as she framed the very words of her confession she saw that she must still wait a little--that was the most agonizing part of it. Yet nothing, she said to herself sternly, nothing, in the end, should be kept back from him. By her very frankness and openness of soul she would hold him and bind him the closer to her. "It is being printed now--but not in my name!" she repeated, weakly, clinging to that one prospective act of redemption. "I thought you would do it," he said, showing no surprise. "And I am glad of it, for your sake, dearest. I don't mind about the book; I do not want that. But it is You, the true You, that I want!" And as he said it his hand sought her hand once more. "But I have done other things, oh, so many other things, that were--were ignoble, that were wrong!" she cried, pitifully, a terror of her past growing up within her. "Do you love me?" he said, suddenly, turning to her. "I would die for you, this day!" she said. And by the beauty and the sudden glory that swept over her face once more he knew her word was not to be doubted. "Then the other things can never count!" he answered, kissing her tenderly on her cold cheek. A cold wind blew up the river, and the dusk was falling. Their day was almost gone. Cordelia looked up at the darkening sky, and held her hands out before her. "See," she said, "the snow-flakes!" A few white flakes drifted and fluttered down between them; she caught at them with her hands, but they eluded her. "Yes," he said, standing close beside her, happily, and gazing with her up into the darkening air. "It _is_ snow, falling already!" Then through the sober autumn air they walked slowly back to the hotel, arm in arm, and silent. "I must be alone, dearest, for the rest of this day," she said, happily. He understood, and left her to her own woman's thoughts. * * * * * When she knew him to be safely in his own room she slipped stealthily down to the hotel telegraph-office and hurriedly wrote out a message for her New York publisher. It said: "Substitute name John Hartley for Cordelia Vaughan on title-page of novel The Unwise Virgins. For this I agree to relinquish all royalty claims. Will explain later. Answer." She signed the message and handed it to the operator with a slightly shaking hand, asking nervously how soon she could get a reply. There was no reason why she should not receive one in two hours, perhaps three hours, at the latest.