I heard and my heart stood still. So this was the end of it. Well, she
had the right of me, though now I began to wish that I had been
less honest, for sometimes women can forgive a lie sooner than such
frankness. I said nothing, my tongue was tied, but a great misery and
weariness entered into me. Stooping down I found the ring, and replacing
it on my finger, I turned to seek the door with a last glance at the
woman who refused me. Halfway thither I paused for one second, wondering
if I should do well to declare myself, then bethought me that if she
would not abate her anger toward me dead, her pity for me living would
be small. Nay, I was dead to her, and dead I would remain.
Now I was at the door and my foot was on its step, when suddenly a
voice, Lily's voice, sounded in my ears and it was sweet and kind.
'Thomas,' said the voice, 'Thomas, before you go, will you not take
count of the gold and goods and land that you placed in my keeping?'
Now I turned amazed, and lo! Lily came towards me slowly and with
outstretched arms.
'Oh! foolish man,' she whispered low, 'did you think to deceive a
woman's heart thus clumsily? You who talked of the beech in the Hall
garden, you who found your way so well to this dark chamber, and spoke
the writing in the ring with the very voice of one who has been dead so
long. Listen: I forgive that friend of yours his broken troth, for he
was honest in the telling of his fault and it is hard for man to live
alone so many years, and in strange countries come strange adventures;
moreover, I will say it, I still love him as it seems that he loves me,
though in truth I grow somewhat old for love, who have lingered long
waiting to find it beyond my grave.
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