Close to him stood Veranilda.

She was cloaked and hooded, so that he could hardly see her face; but her white hands were held out for his.
Heart to heart, mouth to mouth, they whispered.

To be more private, Basil drew her without the garden.

Veranilda's eyes fixed themselves upon the spreading glory of the east; and it moved her to utterance.
'When I was a child,' she said, 'at Ravenna, I gazed once at the sunrise, and behold, in the rays which shot upwards stood an angel, a great, beautiful angel, with wings of blue, and a garment which shone like gold, and on his head was a wreath of I know not what flowers.

I ran to tell my mother, but when she came, alas! the angel had vanished.
No one could tell me certainly what the vision meant.