If I were nearly mad before, the sight of Phyllida, as she stood filled with conflicting emotions, was sufficient to blast for ever the few shreds of reason left me. She no longer wore a virginal colour, but a long rippling gown of flame-coloured silk, whose lowest hem was wrought round with yellow tongues. Her face was more tender, her chin trembled, and those eyes, into whose depths I had gazed for hours, and seen no change in their coldness, were filled with warmth and light. When I had feasted on the sight I leaned forward, and clasping her neck and waist drew her to my bosom. There I held her until she cried out; but even then my arms would not relax, and she was compelled to extricate herself with a charming force. Being my first full embrace it made me delirious. She began to laugh again, childishly, silverily, and taking my hand she paced slowly at my side along the way that led to Stony Mountgrace. We reached the ruined doorway, and stood beneath its wealth of carved foliage. The sound of boys’ singing came from within. Phyllida herself had arranged everything with the old vicar of Drassington. How she had conquered his scruples against reading the ritual in a roofless building I never knew; but the place was still consecrated, and the altar tomb of Elizabeth Colmer, which in past days had been used as the holy table, still stood in the chancel under the east window, where the stained glass of Saint Anthony, with the human-faced swine crawling up his pastoral staff, cast subtle hues on the broken floor. The words of the marriage hymn were indistinctly sung: the choristers’ voices sounded cold and sharp, and the vicar looked almost frenzied with impatience. ‘How is this, madam?’ he said, with his bearded face drawn into the severest lines. ‘You beg me to come here as a favour, and when, after the considerations laid before me I agree, you keep me waiting until an hour after the appointed time!’ ‘An hour?’ I gasped, looking not at the vicar, but at Phyllida. ‘An hour late! Why we met at the moment----’ Phyllida was triumphant. ‘Silence,’ she whispered. ‘I cannot explain, unless that we have dreamed.’ She turned to the ascetic. ‘I am ready to atone in any way for my fault,’ she said contritely. ‘Forgive me, sir, it was unavoidable.’ And she made her eyes so pleading that he had been no man had he not calmed instantly and forgiven her for her guiltless offence. ‘Enter,’ he said. ‘It is almost too late. Had you been absent five more minutes you would not have found me here.’ As we reached the apse the voices of the choristers swelled loudly, before dying in a long sustained murmur, and the vicar, with his tattered black-letter book held near his eyes, began to read the marriage service. Not a word did I understand: I repeated automatically when I was bidden to repeat, I forced the ring on Phyllida’s finger at the ordained time. But all the while I thought of naught, or spiritual or sensual, save her incarnate loveliness.