Henrik excused himself from the party and went immediately to Marie. He found her on the veranda, reclining on a couch. The lamp-light from an open window fell on a pale face, startling in its changed expression. He silently took her hand, her fingers tightening in his grasp. She looked him steadily in the face, her swimming eyes not wavering. Then Henrik knew that he loved this girl yet. For a long time he had tried to forget her, tried to root out his love for her, tried to think that she was not for him. "I'll not try again," he had thought, "for twice now have I been disappointed;" but now a flood of compassionate love engulfed him, and he, too, clung to the fingers in his grasp.
"I am sorry to see you like this," he said, "what is the matter?"
"I don't know."
"Doesn't the doctor know?"
She shook her head with a faint smile. "Sit down, Henrik, I want to talk to you," she said.
He took the low chair by her side. The mother looked at them from the door-way, but did not come out.
"I want you to forgive me," she said.
"That has been done long ago."
"Thank you—now listen. I have been wrong, wickedly wrong, it seems to me—listen! I have not been honest, neither with you, nor myself, nor with the Lord—which is the worst of all. I understood much that you taught me of the restored gospel—It seemed so easy to my understanding; but my pride was in the way, and I would not accept the light. I pushed it away. I kept saying to myself, 'It isn't true,' when I knew all the time that it was. That's the sin I have committed."
"My dear—"