And he covered his eyes with his hand—­I saw tears slowly drop through his fingers.  I gazed at him, half in wonder, half in pity.

“And yet you are a brave man!” I said.

These words roused him.  He met my gaze with such a haggard look of woe that my heart ached for him.  What comfort had he now?  What joy could he ever expect?  All his happiness was centred in the fact of being alive—­alive to the pleasures of living, and to the joys the world could offer to a man who was strong, handsome, rich, and accomplished—­how could he look upon death as otherwise than a loathsome thing—­a thing not to be thought of in the heyday of youthful blood and jollity—­a doleful spectre, in whose bony hands the roses of love must fall and wither!  With a sense of deep commiseration in me, I spoke again with great gentleness.

“You need not look upon Zara’s corpse unless you wish it, Prince,” I said.  “To you, the mysteries of the Hereafter have not been unlocked, because there is something in your nature that cannot and will not believe in God.  Therefore to you, death must be repellent.  I know you are one of those for whom the present alone exists—­you easily forget the past, and take no trouble for the future.  Paris is your heaven, or St. Petersburg, or Vienna, as the fancy takes you; and the modern atheistical doctrines of French demoralization are in your blood.  Nothing but a heaven-sent miracle could make you other than you are, and miracles do not exist for the materialist.  But let me say two words more before you go from this house.  Seek no more to avenge yourself for your love-disappointment on Heliobas—­for you have really nothing to avenge.  By your own confession you only cared for Zara’s body—­that body was always perishable, and it has perished by a sudden but natural catastrophe.  With her soul, you declare you had nothing in common—­that was herself—­and she is alive to us who love her as she sought to be loved.  Heliobas is innocent of having slain her body; he but helped to cultivate and foster that beautiful Spirit which he knew to be her—­for that he is to be honored and commended.  Promise me, therefore, Prince Ivan, that you will never approach him again except in friendship—­indeed, you owe him an apology for your unjust accusation, as also your gratitude for his sparing your life in the recent struggle.”

The Prince kept his eyes steadily fixed upon me all the time I was speaking, and as I finished, he sighed and moved restlessly.

“Your words are compelling, mademoiselle,” he said; “and you have a strange attraction for me.  I know I am not wrong in thinking that you are a disciple of Heliobas, whose science I admit, though I doubt his theories.  I promise you willingly what you ask—­nay, I will even offer him my hand if he will accept it.”

Overjoyed at my success, I answered:  “He is in the chapel, but I will fetch him here.”

Over the Prince’s face a shadow of doubt, mingled with dread, passed swiftly, and he seemed to be forming a resolve in his own mind which was more or less distasteful to him.  Whatever the feeling was he conquered it by a strong effort, and said with firmness: