“And Aaron shall lay both his hands upon the head of the live goat, and confess over him all the iniquities of the children of Israel and all their transgressions in all their sins, putting them upon the head of the goat, and shall send him away by the hand of a fit man into the wilderness.
“And the goat shall bear upon him all their iniquities unto a land not inhabited: and he shall let go the goat in the wilderness.”
He had risen and now stood movelessly before her.
She looked up as she finished. “So it was with you.”
“Yes,” he said in a low voice. “And so I have lived ever since, a murderless Cain with a mark on my brow! So shall I live and die, hated and avoided by all men!”
“No!” she contradicted, coming to him. “That will not be! I see further and clearer than that! It is not for such an end that you have lived and written and suffered! But for something nobler, which the world that hates you now will honor! I see it! I know it!”
“Stop!” he exclaimed, “I cannot bear it. I am not a murderer, Teresa, but all of the past you forgive with such divine compassion, you do not know. There is a silence yet to break which I have kept, a chapter unlovely to look upon that you have not seen.”
“I ask nothing!” she interrupted.
“I must,” he went on with dry lips. “You shall see it all, to the dregs. In that convent, Teresa,—”
She put a hand over his lips. “You need not. For—I already know.”