again--I could draw it or paint it. And after all--"

He stopped--but I said nothing.

"The face of a dream--the face of a dream. She was beautiful.
Not that beauty which is terrible, cold, and worshipful, like the
beauty of a saint; nor that beauty that stirs fierce passions; but
a sort of radiation, sweet lips that softened into smiles, and
grave gray eyes. And she moved gracefully, she seemed to have part
with all pleasant and gracious things--"

He stopped, and his face was downcast and hidden. Then he
looked up at me and went on, making no further attempt to disguise
his absolute belief in the reality of his story.

"You see, I had thrown up my plans and ambitions, thrown up
all I had ever worked for or desired for her sake. I had been a
master man away there in the north, with influence and property and
a great reputation, but none of it had seemed worth having beside
her. I had come to the place, this city of sunny pleasures with
her, and left all those things to wreck and ruin just to save a
remnant at least of my life. While I had been in love with her
before I knew that she had any care for me, before I had imagined
that she would dare--that we should dare, all my life had seemed
vain and hollow, dust and ashes. It was dust and ashes. Night
after night and through the long days I had longed and desired--my
soul had beaten against the thing forbidden!

"But it is impossible for one man to tell another just these
things. It's emotion, it's a tint, a light that comes and goes.