Beatrice’s eyes flashed.  “Is a woman’s heart a dog that must follow at heel?” she asked fiercely.  “We loved.  That was enough.  My father had the power, but not the heart, to come between.  We told him, then, for we were not cowards.  We told him boldly that it must be.  He was a thoughtful man, who spoke little.  He said that we must part at once, before we loved each other better—­and that we should soon forget.  We looked at each other, the man I loved and I. We knew that we should love better yet, parted or together, though we could not tell how that could be.  But we knew also that such love as there was between us was enough.  My father gave no reasons, but I knew that he hated the name of my mother’s nation.  Of course we met again.  I remember that I could cry in those days.  My father had not learned to part us then.  Perhaps he was not quite sure himself, at all events the parting did not come so soon.  We told him that we would wait, for ever if it must be.  He may have been touched, though little touched him at the best.  Then, one day, suddenly and without warning, he took me away to another city.  And what of him?  I asked.  He told me that there was an evil fever in the city and that it had seized him—­the man I loved.  ’He is free to follow us if he pleases,’ said my father.  But he never came.  Then followed a journey, and another, and another, until I knew that my father was travelling to avoid him.  When I saw that I grew silent, and never spoke his name again.  Farther and farther, longer and longer, to the ends of the earth.  We saw many people, many asked for my hand.  Sometimes I heard of him, from men who had seen him lately.  I waited patiently, for I knew that he was on our track, and sometimes I felt that he was near.”

Beatrice paused.

“It is a strange story,” said Sister Paul, who had rarely heard a tale of love.

“The strange thing is this,” Beatrice answered.  “That woman—­what is her name?  Unorna?  She loves him, and she knows where he is.”

“Unorna?” repeated the nun in bewilderment.

“Yes.  She met me after Compline to-night.  I could not but speak to her, and then I was deceived.  I cannot tell whether she knew what I am to him, but she deceived me utterly.  She told me a strange story of her own life.  I was lonely.  In all those years I have never spoken of what has filled me.  I cannot tell how it was.  I began to speak, and then I forgot that she was there, and told all.”

“She made you tell her, by her secret arts,” said Sister Paul in a low voice.

“No—­I was lonely and I believed that she was good, and I felt that I must speak.  Then—­I cannot think how I could have been so mad—­but I thought that we should never meet again, and I showed her a likeness of him.  She turned on me.  I shall not forget her face.  I heard her say that she knew him and loved him too.  When I awoke I was lying on the altar.  That is all I know.”