She stood with her head thrown back, her throat showing, her eyes closed as in prayer. Her face was as pale as the petals of the passion-flower upon the wall. Gabriel, with lips twitching, paced to and fro like one in physical anguish. A hand of ice seemed contracting about his heart. Suddenly, as by some superhuman instinct, he fell down with a half-muffled cry at the girl’s feet, caught her by the knees, and buried his face in her dress. “Joan, Joan.” She still stood with eyes closed, her body quivering, her hands over her heart. “Joan, curse me, for God’s sake curse me!” “No, no.” “That I should have brought this upon you!” “No, no.” “Curse me.” She slipped suddenly to her knees as though her soul failed her, wound her arms about the man’s neck, and hid her face upon his shoulder. They kneeled thus for some moments, wrapped in each other’s arms like two children. Neither spoke. It was a merging of their common woe into one deep flux of silent sympathy. The fall of tears on her cheek roused Joan, like the touch of a child’s hand bestirs a mother. She lifted her head, held the man at arm’s-length, looked in his face with a great flash of womanly tenderness. “Gabriel.” “Girl—” “Weep not for me.” “You shame me too utterly.” “Ah no, do not think that of me. God knows, I shall help you by being strong.” She passed her hand over his forehead, smiled with an infinite wistfulness, lifted up her mouth to his, and kissed him. “Courage,” she said. For the first time he looked in her eyes, steadily, yet with an incredulous awe that was not of earth. Had Christ spoken He could not have breathed a diviner love. “You shame me,” was all he said. “No, no.” “What am I, that you should treat me thus?” “Ah, is it so strange?” “It is marvellous, beyond belief.” She put his hands from her very gently, rose up, and stood at her full height, looking out towards the sea. The blood had risen again from her heart; her lips were no longer tremulous; her eyes shone more bright with hope. Gabriel watched her, holding close under the pine-tree so that he stood in shadow, while Joan breathed in the sun. The scene was figurative to him of her finer beauty of soul. “Gabriel,” she said at last, turning her head so that he saw her pure, strong profile and then the sunlight in her eyes. “I am listening.” “Can you believe me? but I had half prayed for this.” “Joan!” “It is the truth.” He left the shadows of the tree and stood again at the girl’s side. His fingers touched Joan’s. Standing hand in hand, they looked out over the sea at the sun sinking in a whorl of lambent fire. “I am no longer afraid.” “Nor I, save for your sake.” “Ah, Gabriel, what is sacrifice but love transfigured?” The clouds were paling in the west; a glamour of light still poured upward into the heavens. “Had I been less a fool,” he said, “I could have saved all this. Thank God, I am no longer clay, to be thumbed by circumstance!”