so loved by me, so dear beyond all measure. No, I had never been so glad in all my life as in this one short instant of consolation!
"And yet they say that women have intuitive minds!
"I was as it were caught and suspended in an aërial cobweb that stretched over an abyss of waters; and there I gazed upon the golden glitter of the morning landscape now that the tempest was over—gazed into the blue and shimmering stillness. Beneath me, under the bridge of hanging gossamer, rolled the sombre sea of dread and death; before me rose the sea of life, crimson and blood-red in hue. But I—I saw nothing there, save the dawn and the sunshine."
Here she broke off, closed her eyes, and, resting her head on the arm of her easy-chair, remained some time plunged in the contemplation of that past scenery, all azure and gold. I let her rest so for a while, and then, rousing her:
"Well, and what then?" said I.
She knit her brows slightly.
"Then, ah! then! It was a mere idle question, for I troubled about nothing now that I
