have come upon him. But Death--the mystery to which we look as the
solver of all earthly mysteries--has resolved for her this darkest and
saddest perplexity of her life. Tito is gone to his place: and his
baseness shall vex her no more with antagonistic duties and a divided
life. There is no joy, no expressed sense of relief and release; no
reproach of him other than that implied one which springs out of the
necessities of her being, the putting away from her, quietly and
unobtrusively, the material gains of his treasons. The poor innocent
wrong-doer, Tessa, is sought for, rescued, and cared for; and is never
allowed to know the foul wrong to her rescuer of which she has been made
the unconscious instrument. Even to her the language is that "Naldo will
return no more, not because he is cruel, but because he is dead."

One direct trial of her faith and patience remains, through the weakness
and apparent apostasy of Savonarola. Has he, through whom first came to
her definite guidance amid the dark perplexities of her life, been always
untrue? has the light that seemed through him to dawn on her been
therefore misleading and perverting? In almost agonised intentness she
listens for some word, watches for some sign, which shall tell her it has
not been so. She outrages all her womanly sensibilities by being present
at the death-scene, in hope that something there, were it but the
uplifting of the drooping head to the clear true light of heaven, shall
reassure her that the prophet was a true prophet, and his voice to her
the voice of God. But she watches in vain. Without word or sign that
even her quick sure instinct can interpret, Savonarola passes into "the
eternal silence." What measure of overshadowing darkness and sorrow then
again fell over her life we are not told: we only know how that life
passed from under this cloud also into purer and serener light. This
perplexity also solves itself for her in the path of unquestioning
acceptance of duty, human service, and human love; and as she treads this