There, with a wan smile, Angel stood; and with joy, wordless because unspeakable, they fell almost like dead things into each other's arms.

For an hour they sat thus, and never spoke a word, only stroking each other's hands and hair. It was so good for each to know that the other was alive. It took so long for the stored agony in the nerves to relax.

"I haven't eaten a morsel since Wednesday," said Angel, at last.

"Nor I," said Henry.

"Henry, dear, I'm sorry. I know now I was wrong. I give you my word never to doubt you again."

"Thank you, Angel. Don't let us even think of it any more."

"I couldn't live through it again, darling."

"But it can never happen any more, can it?"

"No!--but--if you ever love any woman better than you love me, you'll tell me, won't you? I could bear that better than to be deceived."

"Yes, Angel, I promise to tell you."

"Well, we're really happy again now--are we? I can hardly believe it--"

"You didn't see me outside your house last night, did you?"

"Henry!"

"Yes, I was there. And I watched you carry the light into your bedroom, and when you came to the window to draw down the blind, I thought you must have seen me. Yes, I waited and waited, till I saw the light go out and long after--"

"Oh, Henry--you do love me then?"

"And we do know how to hate each other sometimes, don't we, child?" said Henry, laughing into Angel's eyes, all rainbows and tears.

CHAPTER XLIV

THE END OF A BEGINNING

And now blow, all ye trumpets, and, all ye organs, tremble with exultant sound! Bring forth the harp, and the psaltry, and the sackbut! For the long winter of waiting is at an end, and Mike is flying north to fetch his bride. Now are the walls of heaven built four-square, and to-day was the roof-beam hung with garlands. 'Tis but a small heaven, yet is it big enough for two,--and Mike is flying north, flying north, through the midnight, to fetch his bride.

Henry and the morning meet him at Tyre. Blessings on his little wrinkled face! The wrinkles are deeper and sweeter by a year's hard work. He has laughed with them every night for full twelve months, laughed to make others laugh. To-day he shall laugh for himself alone. The very river seems glad, and tosses its s.h.a.ggy waves like a faithful dog; and over yonder in Sidon, where the sun is building a shrine of gold and pearl, Esther, sleepless too, all night, waits at a window like the morning-star.

Oh, Mike! Mike! Mike! is it you at last?

Oh, Esther, Esther, is it you?

Their faces were so bright, as they gazed at each other, that it seemed they might change to stars and wing together away up into the morning.

Henry s.n.a.t.c.hed one look at the brightness and turned away.

"She looked like a spirit!" said Mike, as they met again further along the road.

"He looked like a little angel," said Esther, as she threw herself into Dot's sympathetic arms.

A few miles from Sidon there stood an old church, dim with memories, in a churchyard mossy with many graves. It was. .h.i.ther some few hours after that unwonted carriages were driving through the snow of that happy winter's day. In one of them Esther and Henry were sitting,--Esther apparelled in--but here the local papers shall speak for us: "The bride," it said, "was attired in a dress of grey velvet trimmed with beaver, and a large picturesque hat with feathers to match; she carried a bouquet of white chrysanthemums and hyacinths."

"The very earth has put on white to be your bridesmaid!" said Henry, looking out on the sunlit snow.

"After all, though, of course, I'm sad in one way," said Esther, more practical in her felicitations, "I'm glad in another that father wouldn't give me away. For it was really you who gave me to Mike long ago; wasn't it?--and so it's only as it should be that you should give me to him to-day."

"You'll never forget what we've been to each other?"

"Don't you know?"

"Yes, but our love has no organs and presents and prayer-books to bind it together."

"Do you think it needs it?"

"Of course not! But it would be fun for us too some day to have a marriage. Why should only one kind of love have its marriage ceremony?

When Mike's and your wedding is over, let's tell him that we're going to send out cards for ours!"

"All right. What form shall the ceremony take--_Parfait Amour_?"

"You haven't forgotten?"

"I shall forget just the second after you--not before--and, no, I won't be mean, I'll not even forget you then."

"Kiss me, Esther," said Henry.

"Kiss me again, Esther," he said. "Do you remember?"

"The cake and the beating?"

"Yes, that was our marriage."

When all the glory of that happy day hung in crimson low down in the west, like a chariot of fire in which Mike and Esther were speeding to their paradise, Henry walked with Angel, homeward through the streets of Tyre, solemn with sunset. In both that happy day still lived like music richly dying.

"Well," said Angel, in words far too practical for such a sunset, "I am so glad it all went off so well. Poor dear Mrs. Mesurier, how bonny she looked! And your dear old Aunt Tipping! Fancy her hiding there in the church--"

"Of course we'd asked her," said Henry; "but, poor old thing, she didn't feel grand enough, as she would say, to come publicly."

"And your poor father! Fancy him coming home for the lunch like that!"

"After all, it was logical of him," said Henry. "I suppose he had made up his mind that he would resist as long as it was any use, and after that--gracefully give in. And he was always fond of Mike."

"But didn't Esther cry, when he kissed her, and said that, since she'd chosen Mike, he supposed he must choose him too. And Mike was as good as crying too?"

"I think every one was. Poor mother was just a mop."