We made our little trip across the water from the ‘Diana’ to the ‘Dream’ in the light of a magnificent sunset.  Loch Scavaig was a blaze of burning colour,—­and the skies above us were flushed with deep rose divided by lines of palest blue and warm gold.  Santoris was waiting on the deck to receive us, attended by his captain and one or two of the principals of the crew, but what attracted and charmed our eyes at the moment was a beautiful dark youth of some twelve or thirteen years of age, clad in Eastern dress, who held a basket full of crimson and white rose petals, which, with a graceful gesture, he silently emptied at our feet as we stepped on board.  I happened to be the first one to ascend the companion ladder, so that it looked as if this fragrant heap of delicate leaves had been thrown down for me to tread upon, but even if it had been so intended it appeared as though designed for the whole party.  Santoris welcomed us with the kindly courtesy which always distinguished his manner, and he himself escorted Miss Harland down to one of the cabins, there to take off the numerous unnecessary wraps and shawls with which she invariably clothed herself on the warmest day,—­I followed them as they went, and he turned to me with a smile, saying:—­

“You know your room?  The same you had yesterday afternoon.”

I obeyed his gesture, and entered the exquisitely designed and furnished apartment which he had said was for a ‘princess,’ and closing the door I sat down for a few minutes to think quietly.  It was evident that things were coming to some sort of crisis in my life,—­and shaping to some destiny which I must either accept or avoid.  Decisive action would rest, as I saw, entirely with myself.  To avoid all difficulty, I had only to hold my peace and go my own way—­refuse to know more of this singular man who seemed to be so mysteriously connected with my life, and return home to the usual safe, if dull, routine of my ordinary round of work and effort.  On the other hand, to accept the dawning joy that seemed showering upon me like a light from Heaven, was to blindly move on into the Unknown,—­to trust unquestioningly to the secret spiritual promptings of my own nature and to give myself up wholly and ungrudgingly to a love which suggested all things yet promised nothing!  Full of the most conflicting thoughts, I paced the room up and down slowly—­the tall mirror reflected my face and figure and showed me the startlingly faithful presentment of the woman I had seen in my strange series of visions,—­the woman who centuries ago had fought against convention and custom, only to be foolishly conquered by them in a thousand ways,—­the woman who had slain love, only that it should rise again and confront her with deathless eyes of eternal remembrance—­the woman who, drowned at last for love’s sake in a sea of wrath and trembling, knelt outside the barred gate of Heaven praying to enter in!  And in my mind I heard again the words spoken by that sweet and solemn Voice which had addressed me in the first of my dreams: