"Outside this gate," he persisted. "I shall wait--and other nights
after that. For I must know--if you are safe--"

"See, I am very safe now. For if I were missed there would be
running and confusion--"

He only drew a little closer to her. "To-morrow night--or another--I
shall come to this door--"

"It must not open to you.... It is a forbidden door--forbidden as
that fortieth door in the old story.... There are thirty and nine
doors in your life, monsieur, that you may open, but this is the
forbidden--"

"I shall be waiting," he insisted. "To-morrow night--or another--"

She moved her head in denial.

"Neither to-morrow nor another night--"

Again their eyes met. He bent over her. He knew a gleam of sharpest
wonder at himself as his arms went swiftly round that shrouding
drapery, and then all duality of consciousness was blotted out in
the rush of his young madness. For within that drapery was the soft,
human sweetness of her; his arms tightened, his face bent close, and
through the sheer gauze of her veil his lips pressed her lips....

Some one was coming down the walk: Footsteps crunched the gravel.

Like a wraith the girl was out of his arms ... in anger or alarm