Maskull gazed at them doubtfully.  “Does this continue?” he inquired.

“No.  I think,” replied the woman, “we can’t be far from the Mornstab Pass.  After that we shall begin to climb again, and then the road will improve perhaps.”

“Can you have been here before?”

“Once I have been to the Pass, but it was not so bad then.”

“You are tired out, Sullenbode.”

“What of it?” she replied, smiling faintly.  “When one has a terrible lover, one must pay the price.”

“We cannot get there tonight, so let us stop at the first shelter we come too.”

“I leave it to you.”

He paced up and down, while the others sat.  “Do you regret anything?” he demanded suddenly.

“No, Maskull, nothing.  I regret nothing.”

“Your feelings are unchanged?”

“Love can’t go back—­it can only go on.”

“Yes, eternally on.  It is so.”

“No, I don’t mean that.  There is a climax, but when the climax has been reached, love if it still wants to ascend must turn to sacrifice.”

“That’s a dreadful creed,” he said in a low voice, turning pale beneath his coating of mud.

“Perhaps my nature is discordant....  I am tired.  I don’t know what I feel.”

In a few minutes they were on their feet again, and the journey recommenced.  Within half an hour they had reached the Mornstab Pass.

The ground here was drier; the broken land to the north served to drain off the moisture of the soil.  Sullenbode led them to the northern edge of the ridge, to show them the nature of the country.  The pass was nothing but a gigantic landslip on both sides of the ridge, where it was the lowest above the underlying land.  A series of huge broken terraces of earth and rock descended toward Barey.  They were overgrown with stunted vegetation.  It was quite possible to get down to the lowlands that way, but rather difficult.  On either side of the landslip, to cast and west, the ridge came down in a long line of sheer, terrific cliffs.  A low haze concealed Barey from view.  Complete stillness was in the air, broken only by the distant thundering of an invisible waterfall.

Maskull and Sullenbode sat down on a boulder, facing the open country.  The moon was directly behind them, high up.  It was almost as light as an Earth day.

“Tonight is like life,” said Sullenbode.

“How so?”

“So lovely above and around us, so foul underfoot.”

Maskull sighed.  “Poor girl, you are unhappy.”

“And you—­are you happy?”

He thought a while, and then replied—­“No.  No, I’m not happy.  Love is not happiness.”

“What is it, Maskull?”

“Restlessness—­unshed tears—­thoughts too grand for our soul to think...”

“Yes,” said Sullenbode.

After a time she asked, “Why were we created, just to live for a few years and then disappear?”