He beheld her, a figure of gold and pale vermilion, redolent of perfume, poised motionless in the faint saffron sheen of the new-risen moon.

She, a creation of sleep, was herself asleep.

She, a dream, was herself dreaming.
Called forth from out the darkness, from the grip of the earth, the embrace of the grave, from out the memory of corruption, she rose into light and life, divinely pure.

Across that white forehead was no smudge, no trace of an earthly pollution--no mark of a terrestrial dishonour.
He saw in her the same beauty of untainted innocence he had known in his youth.

Years had made no difference with her.