But the mind refused to work.

Consciousness seemed to retain nothing but the warm grasp of his hand--the tones of his voice.
He saw her struggle, and pressed on remorselessly.
'Speak to me--say one little kind word.

Oh, you cannot send me away miserable and empty!' She turned to him, and laid her trembling free hand on his arm.

He clasped them both with rapture.
'Give me a little time.' 'No, no,' he said, and it almost seemed to her that he was smiling: 'time for you to escape me again my wild mountain bird; time for you to think yourself and me into all sorts of moral mists! No, you shall not have it.

Here--alone with God and the dark--bless me or undo me.