“Martin—Martin Valliant, take it not to heart. God slays men sometimes; it is right and good that they should be slain.”
She bent over him with infinite compassion.
“How can I lift this burden from you, you who have striven to love men?”
He dropped his arm and stared at the grass.
“What has happened to me? I do not understand. Yet that man there was an evil beast, and I struck him in clean wrath. What does God wish? I have lost the light in my soul.”
He got up and began to walk to and fro with great strides, his forehead all knotted, his mouth awry. And Mellis watched him, keeping silent, but with a great pity in her eyes. He was like a blind man, groping his way, lost in the confusion of his own soul.
“Martin——”
He turned to her with dull anguish in his eyes.
“God will not speak to me. I hear no voice but yours. I will go and surrender myself.”
“To whom?”