"Ah, of a truth!" he said, "had Paul known thee, never would he have said a married man is careful only for the things of this world. Surely now I shall belong more truly than ever to the Lord."
He bent over her and kissed her tenderly on her forehead. Her head, with its smooth, orderly golden braids, drooped shyly on to his shoulder, and her heart beat against his. His kiss was such as a brother bestows on a beloved sister, but her lips were too pure to know their loss.
He held her to him in sweet content at having found the wife he had dreamed of. He knew nothing of the love that burns and scorches, instead of soothing, and as he felt the deep peace of being in her presence and feeling her love like a benediction rest upon him, he marvelled yet again, as so often he had done in the past, how the Fathers of the Church could so have maligned the love of man for woman.
His vision stretched far along the future, seeing only peace in his life, and the crowning joy of a woman's touch which blunders not.
"The Lord hath been very gracious unto me," he said simply, looking down on her.
Then, at the sound of a light laugh, he turned and met the eyes of Rose Westel.
XV
She made a beautiful picture as she stood there with an inward tumult chasing the rich blood in and out her cheeks, and in her eyes a world of passion and rebellion. Always beautiful, there was a subtle tremulous excitement about her now which, as she gazed boldly at the young poor priest, leapt into his veins as flames leap into fagots. She was trembling from a revelation of her own self, and she had flown home in a wild mood, in which fear and recklessness and a certain exhilaration from which she could not escape, all had their part.