“How can I promise that, if he insults you?”

“No, I did not mean that exactly.  Promise that you will not forget everything and raise your hand against him.  You see I know you would.”

“No, I will not raise my hand against him.  That was in the promise I made you.  And as for being angry, I will do my best to keep my temper.”

“I know you will.  Now you must go.  Good-by, love!  Good-by, for a little while.”

“For such a little time shall we say good-by?  I hate the word; it makes me think of the day when I left you last.”

“How can I tell what may happen to you when you are out of my sight?” asked Dolores.  “And what is ‘good-by’ but a blessing each prays for the other?  That is all it means.  It does not mean that we part for long, love.  Why, I would say it for an hour!  Good-by, dear love, good-by!”

She put up her face to kiss him, and it was so full of trust and happiness that the word lost all the bitterness it has gathered through ages of partings, and seemed, what she said it was, a loving blessing.  Yet she said it very tenderly, for it was hard to let him go even for less than an hour.  He said it, too, to please her; but yet the syllables came mournfully, as if they meant a world more than hers, and the sound of them half frightened her, so that she was sorry she had asked him for the word.

“Not so!” she cried, in quick alarm.  “You are not keeping anything from me?  You are only going to the next room to meet the King—­are you sure?”

“That is all.  You see, the word frightened you.  It seems such a sad word to me—­I will not say it again.”

He kissed her gently, as if to soothe her fear, and then he opened the door and set the key in the lock on the inside.  Then when he was outside, he lingered a moment, and their lips met once more without a word, and they nodded and smiled to one another a last time, and he closed the door and heard her lock it.

When she was alone, she turned away as if he were gone from her altogether instead of being in the next room, where she could hear him moving now and then, as he placed his chair near the light to read and arranged the candlesticks on the table.  Then he went to the other door and opened it and opened the one beyond upon the terrace, and she knew that he was looking out to see if any one were there.  But presently he came back and sat down, and she distinctly heard the rustle of the strong writing-paper as he unfolded a letter.  It was hers.  He was going to read it, as they had agreed.

So she sat down where she could look at the door, and she tried to force her eyes to see through it, to make him feel that she was watching him, that she came near him and stood beside him, and softly read the words for him, but without looking at them, because she knew them all by heart.  But it was not the same as if she had seen him, and it was very hard to be shut off from his sight by an impenetrable piece