She found herself in Pierre’s arms. His eyes were on her face. Their love enveloped her and drew her close—closer than ever before. It was like something in which she lost herself. She lay still, looking up at him.
“Lizette,” he whispered brokenly. He put his face down against hers. “My brave, beautiful Lizette!”
Tears sprang to her eyes; an incredible happiness flooded her being.
“It is the miracle of Little Noël,” she whispered.
Pierre paid no heed. He seemed not to care about her meaning; he cared only for her. Raising her to her feet, he supported her with his arm. He gazed in her face as though his hunger for it could never be appeased; and at last he put one hand beneath her chin and turned her head gently to one side.
“This is the Lizette I left,” he said—“the Lizette whose beautiful face made me forget her soul. I loved her as a man loves a woman when both are young.”
He stopped, and then he turned Lizette’s face so that his eyes rested upon the side which had been burned.
“And this—” He broke off; when he could speak again, his voice had a hushed, exquisite note—“and this,” he said, “is the Lizette I never knew. It is the wonderful, beautiful soul of Lizette. When we are old and our bodies have changed, still I shall always see your brave, tender, beautiful soul.”
But Lizette, with a low cry, had pushed him from her. She put a hand to her face.
“The burns!” she gasped. “I feel the burns!”