Mastering the situation I reflected a little while and then spoke straight out to them.

“My friends,” I said, “as I see that you have guessed, Yva and I are affianced to each other and love each other perfectly.”

“Yes, Arbuthnot,” said Bastin, “we saw that in your face, and in hers as she bade us good night before she went into the cave, and we congratulate you and wish you every happiness.”

“We wish you every happiness, old fellow,” chimed in Bickley.  He paused a while, then added, “But to be honest, I am not sure that I congratulate you.”

“Why not, Bickley?”

“Not for the reason that you may suspect, Arbuthnot, I mean not because you have won where we have lost, as it was only to be expected that you would do, but on account of something totally different.  I told you a while ago and repetition is useless and painful.  I need only add therefore that since then my conviction has strengthened and I am sure, sorry as I am to say it, that in this matter you must prepare for disappointment and calamity.  That woman, if woman she really is, will never be the wife of mortal man.  Now be angry with me if you like, or laugh as you have the right to do, seeing that like Bastin and yourself, I also asked her to marry me, but something makes me speak what I believe to be the truth.”

“Like Cassandra,” I suggested.

“Yes, like Cassandra who was not a popular person.”  At first I was inclined to resent Bickley’s words—­who would not have been in the circumstances?  Then of a sudden there rushed in upon my mind the conviction that he spoke the truth.  In this world Yva was not for me or any man.  Moreover she knew it, the knowledge peeped out of every word she spoke in our passionate love scene by the lake.  She was aware, and subconsciously I was aware, that we were plighting our troth, not for time but for eternity.  With time we had little left to do; not for long would she wear the ring I gave her on that holy night.

Even Bastin, whose perceptions normally were not acute, felt that the situation was strained and awkward and broke in with a curious air of forced satisfaction: 

“It’s uncommonly lucky for you, old boy, that you happen to have a clergyman in your party, as I shall be able to marry you in a respectable fashion.  Of course I can’t say that the Glittering Lady is as yet absolutely converted to our faith, but I am certain that she has absorbed enough of its principles to justify me in uniting her in Christian wedlock.”

“Yes,” I answered, “she has absorbed its principles; she told me as much herself.  Sacrifice, for instance,” and as I spoke the word my eyes filled with tears.

“Sacrifice!” broke in Bickley with an angry snort, for he needed a vent to his mental disturbance.  “Rubbish.  Why should every religion demand sacrifice as savages do?  By it alone they stand condemned.”

“Because as I think, sacrifice is the law of life, at least of all life that is worth the living,” I answered sadly enough.  “Anyhow I believe you are right, Bickley, and that Bastin will not be troubled to marry us.”