She was less afraid of love and the man who gave and
took it, now. Already it seemed that Vanno and she had always been
lovers, not sad, parted lovers, but happy playmates in a world made for
them. There could not have been a time when they did not understand
each other. Everything before this day had been a dream. "Do you know,"
she said, "why I came here--I mean, why the cure asked me? He told me
that I must come and 'save' you. As if I could! It was I who needed
saving."
[Illustration: "'IT WAS FATE BROUGHT YOU--TO GIVE YOU TO ME. DO YOU
REGRET IT?'"]
"He knew," Vanno answered, speaking more to himself than to her, "that
we should save each other."
As he spoke, a foot ostentatiously rattled the gravel of the path, at a
safe distance. The cure coughed, and coughed again. A serious catching
in the throat he seemed to have, for a man who lived in the fresh air
and laughed at the notion of a "sunset chill."
Vanno took Mary's hand and kept it in his as he led her out of the
arbour.
"This is what your blessing has done, Father," he said.
Then, the cure must have blessed him, too!
The priest smiled his good smile as he came toward them, the sky flaming
behind his black-clad figure, like banners waving.
"I thought. I hoped. No, I knew!" And he smiled contentedly. "The stars
have ceased to desire the moth, a well-known phenomenon which often
upsets the solar system. The moth has lost its attraction. The stars
have found each other."
"We have found each other," Mary said, "and I believe--I believe that we
have found ourselves, our real selves.
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