But Isabel was stronger:  “No, dear, you have not lost, you have found me.  To have lost each other would have been never to have met.  Dear, I love to think that you might be weak for my sake.  No woman can help a man be strong who cannot first make him weak.  Ah, love, how weak I could be for your sake,—­and how strong!... but be strong for mine, be strong for Jenny’s sake.  I love that best.”  Then for a moment they stood lost once more, locked in an embrace so touchingly kind, so sheltering, so calm, that their very attitude was home; and, had they had ears or eyes for a world outside that home, they might have seen, at that dark half-opened staircase door, a little face look in happy and draw back dead; for Jenny had followed them more quickly than she or they had expected, and, not finding them in the lecture-hall, had sought them here with a light heart.  She had heard none of their words; she had only seen that look of home upon their faces and written across their arms.

Very quietly she stole away.  She felt very dazed and tired.  The shock had been so swift that already it seemed half unreal.  She felt she must sit down, and, passing into the silent chapel, lit only with dim reflections from without, she sank on to a seat and thought of little but that it was good to be sitting down, and that the darkness was good, and that there looming out of the shadow was Theophil’s pulpit, and beneath was her little harmonium,—­to-morrow night would be her choir-practice, she mustn’t forget that; no, she mustn’t forget that—­and then the darkness began to frame flashing pictures of that dreadful glimpse of brightness—­were they still standing like that?—­how happy they looked!—­and would they always go on standing together in brightness like that, while she sat here in the darkness.  Well, the darkness was good; how she should dread brightness for the future.  If only she need not go to the recital!—­might she not be spared that?  No! she must have courage, she must go, they must not know she had seen them, not yet, not till she had thought what must be done, not till she had made her plans.  It would have to be talked of if she let them know.  That would be terrible.  Isabel would be gone to-morrow, and then she might speak to Theophil, might set him free.  But now she must go,—­she must not be later than they; they would be passing down to the hall presently, she must be there before them,—­she must be quick,—­she must go now....

As Isabel and Theophil entered the hall together, and smiled a recognising smile at Jenny already in her place, she was able to smile back at them, though there were some who thought she looked very white, and found her very quiet when they tried to talk to her.