She turned and went down the steps and walked away, holding her hands, close to her eyes like blinkers, so that she might be the less afflicted by the night, whose beauty was a reproach to her.  A desire to look out towards the sea and the flatlands came on her.  This temple set among the woods was a human place; men had laid the stones, men had planted the trees, men had thought of it before it was.  It was the stage for a scene in the human drama, which she had not been able to play.  But the sea and the flatlands were not made by men; they made humanity seem a little thing, and human success and failure not reasonable causes for loud laughter or loud weeping.  At the hill’s edge she leaned against a tree and gazed down on the moon-diluted waters, on the moon-powdered lands, and was jealous of the plain, disturbing woman who kept herself covered with the quietness of the marshes to the distress of others; and saw suddenly, on the path at the foot of the slope, the far, weak ray of a dancing lantern.

She ran back to the temple.  All she cared for really was pleasing him.  “Richard, Richard!  I’ve found her!  She’s down there on the marshes!”

He was out beside her in a second.  “Where?  How do you know?”

“I saw her lantern down on the marshes!”

When they got back to the hill’s edge the light was still to be seen, bobbing along towards the elm brow.  Richard clipped Ellen’s waist to show her how well pleased he was with her.  “Ah, that’ll be Marion!” he said.  “Nobody else would be on the marshes at this hour.”  Then a little wind of anger blew over his voice.  “Has she been to his tomb?  Can she have been to his tomb in the time?  It’s a steep climb for her.  I wonder....  I wonder....”

The lantern bobbed out of sight behind the elm row.  Feeling that they were again alone together, Ellen raised her lips to be kissed, but he had already turned away.  “Let’s go home now!” he said urgently.  “I want to know where she’s been.”

The place seemed far more beautiful to her than it had done before.  “Oh!  Now you’re sure she’s quite safe, mayn’t we stay here a little?” she begged.

“No, no.  Some other night.  I’ll bring you to-morrow night.  But not now, not now.”

She followed laggingly, looking about her with infatuation.  There was something religious about the scene.  Rites of some true form of worship might fitly be celebrated here.  All appeared more majestic and more sacred than in the strained, bickering moments before she showed him the lantern.  Now she perceived that it was the silver circle of trees which was the real temple, and that the marble belvedere was but a human offering laid before the shrine.  It was in there, along the ebony paths which ran among the glistening thickets, that one would find the presence of the divinity.

“Oh, Richard!  It will never be so beautiful as this on any other night!  Let us stay!”

“No.  It will be just as good any moonlit night.  I swear I’ll bring you.  But now I want to get back home.”