"Oh don't," she cried, "when you talk like that I am afraid of you."
"Have you never heard it?"
Gabrielle wrenched her hands from his and covered her pretty little ears with them.
"No, no," she cried, "and I don't want to. If Punon is really doomed, there is still plenty of time. I will not hear the Voice; I could not endure the hardships."
"But the King, I am told, takes care of all those who start on the journey, and at the end we shall see Him in His beauty."
"There is no King and no Radiant City," exclaimed the girl petulantly, "no one believes in that story now; and you have not really heard a Voice; it is only in your imagination."
"But I have heard the Voice," persisted Amer.
"Oh don't," cried Gabrielle, "I begin to hate you when you say these things, we had better part, Amer. I could not have a husband who frightens me by his mad talk, and who insists upon taking me this long journey. I will not go, you must choose between the Radiant City of your dreams and me."
"Must I then go alone?" Amer rose as he said these words, and stood looking down upon her with such tenderness in his face that Gabrielle repented of her hard words.
"No," she said, stretching out her hands towards him, "you must not go alone, you must not go at all. I want you Amer, and cannot do without you; you must stay with me. You say you love me; love me enough then to forget the Radiant City and to stay and work for me; you will not, you cannot leave me."