"Rosalie--my life," he urged, hoarse misery in his voice, "the only thing
I have to give you is the bare soul of a truthful man--I am that now at
least. You have made me so. If I deceived the whole world, if I was as
the thief upon the cross, I should still be truthful to you. You open
your heart to me--let me open mine to you, to see it as it is. Once
my soul was like a watch, cased and carried in the pocket of life,
uncertain, untrue, because it was a soul made, not born. I must look at
the hands to know the time, and because it varied, because the working
did not answer to the absolute, I said: 'The soul is a lie.' You--you
have changed all that, Rosalie. My soul now is like a dial to the sun.
But the clouds are there above, and I do not know what time it is in
life. When the clouds break--if they ever break--and the sun shines, the
dial will speak the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth--"

He paused, confused, for he had repeated the words of a witness taking
the oath in court.

"'So help me God!"' she finished the oath for him. Then, with a sudden
change of manner, she came to her feet with a spring. She did not quite
understand. She was, however, dimly conscious of the power she had over
his chivalrous mind: the power of the weak over the strong--the tyranny
of the defended over the defender. She was a woman tortured beyond
bearing; and she was fighting for her very life, mad with anguish as she
struggled.

"I do not understand you," she cried, with flashing eyes. "One minute
you say you do not believe in anything, and the next you say, 'So help me
God!'"