“Do you love him still?”

“With all my broken heart——­”

“Then do not leave his happiness to chance alone, but go at once.  There is one little act of Heaven’s work still in your power.  Make it all yours.”

His great hands rested on her shoulders and his eyes looked down to hers.

“Is it so bitter to do right?” he asked.

“It is very bitter,” she answered.

Very slowly she turned, and as she moved he went beside her, gently urging her and seeming to support her.  Slowly, through vestibule and passage, they went on and entered together the great hall of the flowers.  The Wanderer was there alone.

He uttered a short cry and sprang to meet her, but stepped back in awe of the great white-robed figure that towered by her side.

“Beatrice!” he cried, as they passed.

“I am not Beatrice,” she answered, her downcast eyes not raised to look at him, moving still forward under the gentle guidance of the giant’s hand.

“Not Beatrice—­no—­you are not she—­you are Unorna!  Have I dreamed all this?”

She had passed him now, and still she would not turn her head.  But her voice came back to him as she walked on.

“You have dreamed what will very soon be true,” she said.  “Wait here, and Beatrice will soon be with you.”

“I know that I am mad,” the Wanderer cried, making one step to follow her, then stopping short.  Unorna was already at the door.  The ancient sleeper laid one hand upon her head.

“You will do it now,” he said.

“I will do it—­to the end,” she answered.  “Thank God that I have made you live to tell me how.”

So she went out, alone, to undo what she had done so evilly well.

The old man turned and went towards the Wanderer, who stood still in the middle of the hall, confused, not knowing whether he had dreamed or was really mad.

“What man are you?” he asked, as the white-robed figure approached.

“A man, as you are, for I was once young—­not as you are, for I am very old, and yet like you, for I am young again.”

“You speak in riddles.  What are you doing here, and where have you sent Unorna?”

“When I was old, in that long time between, she took me in, and I have slept beneath her roof these many years.  She came to me to-day.  She told me all her story and all yours, waking me from my sleep, and asking me what she should do.  And she is gone to do that thing of which I told her.  Wait and you will see.  She loves you well.”

“And you would help her to get my love, as she had tried to get it before?” the Wanderer asked with rising anger.  “What am I to you, or you to me, that you would meddle in my life?”

“You to me?  Nothing.  A man.”

“Therefore an enemy—­and you would help Unorna—­let me go!  This home is cursed.  I will not stay in it.”  The hoary giant took his arm, and the Wanderer started at the weight and strength of the touch.