"Since then?" she asked softly.
"Since then I have been trying to build my life up out of its ruins. I have tried to win content and even gladness, for I hold that man should be master of himself, even of remorse for his old sins. You see, I've been busy trying to find out people who had the same kind of misery, or some other kind, to face."
"Shepherd of the wretched," said the girl dreamily.
"Something like that," he answered.
The girl's face was all a-quiver for pity of the tale; in listening to the story of his life she had completely forgotten her own. Then, before she knew what was happening, he rose abruptly and held out his hand.
"Every minute that I stay makes matters harder," he said. "I've got to go to see if I cannot win gladness even out of this, for still my gospel is the gospel of joy. Good-by."
Suddenly Daphne realized that he was gone! She could hear his footsteps on the pebble-stones of the walk as he swung on with his long stride. She started to run after him, then stopped. After all, how could she find words for what she had to say? Walking to the great gate by the highway she looked wistfully between its iron rods, for one last glimpse of him. A sudden realization came to her that she knew nothing about him, not even an address, "except Delphi," she said whimsically to herself. Only a minute ago he had been there; and now she had wantonly let him go out of her life forever.
"I wonder if the Madonna threw my roses away," she thought, coming back with slow feet to the arbor, and realizing for the first time since she had reached the Villa Accolanti that she was alone, and very far away from home.