"Whither are we going?"
"To the place where we shall be united once more."
"Will it be soon?"
"Look." And Christophe, making a supreme effort to raise his head—(God! How heavy it was!)—saw the river overflowing its banks, covering the fields, moving on, august, slow, almost still. And, like a flash of steel, on the edge of the horizon there seemed to be speeding towards him a line of silver streams, quivering in the sunlight. The roar of the ocean…. And his heart sank, and he asked:
"Is it He?"
And the voices of his loved ones replied:
"It is He!"
And his brain dying, said to itself:
"The gates are opened…. That is the chord I was seeking!… But it is not the end! There are new spaces!…—We will go on, to-morrow."
O joy, the joy of seeing self vanish into the sovereign peace of God, whom all his life he had so striven to serve!…