hands assiduously. He must feel perfectly clean and free--fresh, as if
he had washed away all the years of soilure in this morning's sea and
sun and sand. It was the purification. Siegmund became again a happy
priest of the sun. He felt as if all the dirt of misery were soaked out
of him, as he might soak clean a soiled garment in the sea, and bleach
it white on the sunny shore. So white and sweet and tissue-clean he
felt--full of lightness and grace.

The garden in front of their house, where Helena was waiting for him,
was long and crooked, with a sunken flagstone pavement running up to the
door by the side of the lawn. On either hand the high fence of the
garden was heavy with wild clematis and honeysuckle. Helena sat
sideways, with a map spread out on her bench under the bushy little
laburnum tree, tracing the course of their wanderings. It was very
still. There was just a murmur of bees going in and out the brilliant
little porches of nasturtium flowers. The nasturtium leaf-coins stood
cool and grey; in their delicate shade, underneath in the green
twilight, a few flowers shone their submerged gold and scarlet. There
was a faint scent of mignonette. Helena, like a white butterfly in the
shade, her two white arms for antennae stretching firmly to the bench,
leaned over her map. She was busy, very busy, out of sheer happiness.
She traced word after word, and evoked scene after scene. As she
discovered a name, she conjured up the place. As she moved to the next
mark she imagined the long path lifting and falling happily.

She was waiting for Siegmund, yet his hand upon the latch startled her.
She rose suddenly, in agitation. Siegmund was standing in the sunshine
at the gate. They greeted each other across the tall roses.

When Siegmund was holding her hand, he said, softly laughing: