Only the rushing of the river sounded in my ears.

I rose slowly, and mounted the steps.

A tiny white marble mosque of wonderful beauty--for he who erected it
was one of the world's great artists, whose works will live to glorify
his name and his art when all his follies shall have been
forgotten--stood in a court paved with marble.

It was encircled with a low coping of the whitest of stone. Over this
low wall vines were already growing, and the woodbine that was mingled
with it was stained with those glorious tints in which Nature says to
life, "Even death is beautiful."

The wide bronze doors on either side were open.

I accepted the fact without even wondering why--or asking myself who,
in opening them, had discovered my presence!

I entered.

For a brief time I stood once more within the room where she lay.

An awful peace fell on my soul, as if her soul had whispered in the
words we had so often read together:

"I lie so composedly
Now in my bed--"

I knew at last, as I gazed, that all her life, and all mine, as well,