"But the jealousy was mine?" Strange how she had already set aside the catastrophe, as being a matter of lighter moment.
"I loved you too well, Greta, and the Lord grudged it," said the preacher simply.
The girl got up from her chair and stood eye to eye with him.
"Love!" she cried, with a little sobbing catch in her voice. "What do you mean by love, Gabriel Hirst?"
A quiver ran through the preacher. His eyes dilated. His hands went out and gripped invisible shapes.
"Love is a thing that makes you run mad and grovel like a beast—that makes you run sane and soar like an angel. Love is more than the Law and the Prophets, and a lifetime of fighting with the devil.—Nay, Greta, forgive me. Lass, I yearn for you so—and—I—forget that I am a murderer."
"You love like that?" said Greta, slowly. "Then, dear, you can take me and do what you will with me."
The preacher felt two arms about his neck, and a warm mouth against his own. Murder, and sin, and vengeance of the Lord, they were all blotted out for one full moment. He knew himself a man.