“I am the only person who will ever know that,” she said proudly.
He held out his right hand; she put hers into it, and then he cast his hat away, and suddenly clasped her.
“Take the last kiss I have to give in this gorgeous world!” she cried.
As he kissed her, she sobbed in her throat; and her quick tears wetted his cheek as their lips met the second time. He kissed the ends of her hair, her neck, her hands, the brocade that covered her bosom, then let her free of his embrace, and pulled the long iron chain.
As the strident clang of the bell echoed through the convent, he picked up her beaver and gave it her.
“You know?” she asked. Her lips were still throbbing, so that she could scarcely speak.
“Know?” he murmured unsteadily.
“The great—the useless—love I have always had—for you.”
The convent door opened.