"Go to him, mother," said Elsa, wisely and with pity.
The mother hesitated, pulled by the old and the new love, by the fear that the new-found could be hers but a little while. Slowly she let Paul's hand fall, and slower still she followed Arthur's footsteps.
"I wasn't quite brave enough," he said, when she found him. "They love. And love me well, mother, for I am the broken man."
She pressed his head against her heart. "My boy!" But her glance was leveled at the amber-tinted window through which she had come.
To Warrington, Elsa was a little thinner, and of color there was none; but her eyes shone with all the splendor of the Oriental stars at which he had so often gazed with mute inquiry.
"Galahad!" she said, and smiled. "Well, what have you to say?"
"I? In God's name, what can I say but that I love you?"
"Well, say it, and stop the ache in my heart! Say it, and make me forget the weary eighteen thousand miles I have journeyed to find you! Say it, and hold me close for I am tired!… Listen!" she whispered, lifting her head from his shoulder.
From out the stillness of the summer night came a jarring note, the eternal protest of Rajah.