“No,” he answered, “only woman and God love in that way.”
Suddenly he seemed to realize to the full the glory of her sympathy and understanding. It was as though their love in this moment of bitter trial had passed the greatest of all tests, and stood now triumphant, the conqueror of life and death.
All the years of misery were blotted out in the wonder of this revelation of womanhood, and on the instant his desire for life in unity with her came surging back into his heart.
“Monimé,” he said, “this is the biggest moment of all. Whatever I may suffer will be worth while, because it will have brought me the knowledge that our love transcends the ways of man. By God!—I’ll stand my trial; I’ll make a fight for my life, even though the chances of success are small. I didn’t know that such love existed.”
She laughed. “You didn’t know,” she whispered, “because, as I once told you, men don’t bother to study women.”
He looked up at her in the dim light, and of a sudden it seemed to his overwrought fancy that the sanctuary was filled with her presence, as though she were one with the women of all the ages, pressing forward from every side to tend him, to bind up his wounds, to stand by him in his adversity, to forgive his sins. He saw her revealed to him as the eternal woman, the everlasting companion, wife and mother, for ever watching over his welfare, for ever acting upon a code of principles other than that of man, for ever drawing knowledge from sources unattainable to man. Of no account were the little shams of the sex, such as Dolly; they were swamped amidst the hosts of the good and the true. It had been his misfortune to encounter one of the former; but his disillusionment was forgotten in the all-pervading sympathy which now enfolded him like the tender wings of Hathor.
He scrambled to his feet and stood before her, gazing into her shadowy face. “Come,” he said, “the night air is too chilly for you. You must go back to the hotel, and I must go with these confounded little tin soldiers.” His voice was cheery and his head was held high once more.
They came out of the black sanctuary hand-in-hand, and stood in the columned portico before the entrance, in the dimly reflected light of the lanterns.
“Well, have you finished?” the Consul asked, knocking out the ashes from his pipe against the uplifted heel of his boot.