"You believe what I say, Ruth?"
"Yes," with an effort.
"And you won't give me up because evil is spoken against me?"
"No."
"And all is the same as before between us?"
Dare burst into a torrent of gratitude, but she broke suddenly away from him, and went swiftly up-stairs again to her own room.
The release had not come. She laid her head down upon the table, and Hope, which had ventured back to her for one moment, took her lamp and went quite away, leaving the world very dark.
There are turning-points in life when a natural instinct is a surer guide than noble motive or high aspiration, and consequently the more thoughtful and introspective nature will sometimes fall just where a commonplace one would have passed in safety. Ruth had acted for the best. When for the first time in her life she had been brought into close contact with a life spent for others, its beauty had appealed to her with irresistible force, and she had willingly sacrificed herself to an ideal life of devotion to others.
"But we are punished for our purest deeds,
And chasten'd for our holiest thoughts."