"As I came," said he.
"Before I go," said she, "I am going to ask you a question. You have asked my friends a lot of questions these six nights, which they have answered frankly, and you have twisted their answers round your little finger. Now you must answer my question as frankly."
"And what will you do?" asked Martin.
"I won't twist your answer," said Gillian gently. "I'll take it for what it is worth. You have been laughing up your sleeve a little at my friends because, having a quarrel with men, they were sworn to live single. But you live single too. Tell me, if you please, what is your quarrel with girls?"
Martin dropped her hands until he held each by the little finger only, and then he answered, "That they are so much too good for us, Gillian."
"Thank you, Martin," said Gillian, taking her hands away. "And now please ask them to send over the swing, for it is time for me to go to Adversane." And as she spoke the light played over her eyes again and floated him up to the surface of things where he could swim without drowning. He saw now the flowers of her loveliness, but no longer the deeps of those gray pools where the light shimmered between herself and him. So he turned and climbed to the pent roof of the Well-House, and looked towards the group of shadows clustered under the apple-tree around the swing; and they understood and launched it through the air, and he caught it as it came. And Gillian in a moment was up beside him.
"Are you ready?" said Martin.
"Yes," she answered getting on the swing, "thank you. And thank you for everything. Thank you for coming three times this year. Thank you for the stories. Thank you for giving their happiness again to my darling friends. Thank you for all the songs. Thank you for drying my tears."
"Are they all dried up?" said Martin.
"All," said Gillian.