There on the floor, where she had slipped
down, lay Lady de Lannoy in a swoon. She called out instinctively,
forgetting for the moment that the man was blind, but feeling all the old
confidence which he had won in her heart:

'Oh! Mr. Robinson, help me! Lady de Lannoy has fainted too, and I do
not know what to do!' As she spoke she looked up at him and remembered
his blindness. But she had no time to alter her words; the instant she
had spoken Harold, who had been leaning against the window-sash, and
whose mind was calmer since with his acute hearing he too had heard Pearl
sigh, seemed to leap into the room. 'Where is she? Where is she? Oh, God, now am I blind indeed!' It gave her a pang to hear him and to see him turn helplessly with his
arms and hands outstretched as though he would feel for her in the air. Without pause, and under an instinctive and uncontrollable impulse, he
tore the bandages from his eyes. The sun was streaming in. As he met it
his eyes blinked and a cry burst from him; a wild cry whose joy and
surprise pierced even through the shut portals of the swooning woman's
brain. Not for worlds would she ever after have lost the memory of that
sound:

'Light! light! Oh, God! Oh, God! I am not blind!' But he looked round him still in terrified wonder:

'Where is she? Where is she? I cannot see her! Stephen! Stephen! where are you?' Mrs. Stonehouse, bewildered, pointed where Stephen's
snow-white face and brilliant hair seemed in the streaming sunlight like
ivory and gold:

'There! There!' He caught her arm mechanically, and putting his eyes to
her wrist, tried to look along her pointed finger. In an instant he
dropped her arm moaning. 'I cannot see her! What is it that is over me? This is worse than to be
blind!' He covered his face with his hands and sobbed. He felt light strong fingers on his forehead and hands; fingers whose
touch he would have known had they been laid on him were he no longer
quick. A voice whose music he had heard in his dreams for two long years
said softly:

'I am here, Harold! I am here! Oh! do not sob like that; it breaks my
heart to hear you!' He took his hands from his face and held hers in
them, staring intently at her as though his passionate gaze would win
through every obstacle. That moment he never forgot. Never could forget! He saw the room all
rich in yellow. He saw Pearl, pale but glad-eyed, lying on a sofa
holding the hand of her mother, who stood beside her. He saw the great
high window open, the lines of the covered stone balcony without, the
stretch of green sward all vivid in the sunshine, and beyond it the blue
quivering sea. He saw all but that for which his very soul longed;
without to see which sight itself was valueless . . . But still he
looked, and looked; and Stephen saw in his dark eyes, though he could not
see her, that which made her own eyes fill and the warm red glow on her
face again . . . Then she raised her eyes again, and the gladness of her
beating heart seemed the answer to his own. For as he looked he saw, as though emerging from a mist whose obscurity
melted with each instant, what was to him the one face in all the world. He did not think then of its beauty--that would come later; and besides
no beauty of one born of woman could outmatch the memorised beauty which
had so long held his heart. But that he had so schooled himself in long
months of gloomy despair, he would have taken her in his arms there and
then; and, heedless of the presence of others, have poured out his full
heart to her. Mrs. Stonehouse saw and understood. So too Pearl, who though a child was
a woman-child; softly they rose up to steal away. But Stephen saw them;
her own instincts, too, told her that her hour had not come. What she
hoped for must come alone! So she called to her guests:

'Don't go! Don't go, Mrs. Stonehouse. You know now that Harold and I
are old friends, though neither of us knew it--till this moment. We were
brought up as . . . almost as brother and sister. Pearl, isn't it lovely
to see your friend . . . to see The Man again?' She was so happy that she could only express herself, with dignity,
through the happiness of others. Pearl actually shrieked with joy as she rushed across the room and flung
herself into Harold's arms as he stooped to her. He raised her; and she
kissed him again and again, and put her little hands all over his face
and stroked, very, very gently, his eyes, and said:

'Oh, I am so glad! And so glad your poor eyes are unbind again! May I
call you Harold, too?' 'You darling!' was all he could say as he kissed her, and holding her in
one arm went across and shook hands with Mrs. Stonehouse, who wrung his
hand hard. There was a little awkwardness in the group, for none of them knew what
would be best to do next. In the midst of it there came a light knock at
the door, and Mr. Hilton entered saying:

'They told me you wished to see me at once--Hulloa!' He rushed across
the room and took Harold by the shoulders, turning his face to the light. He looked in his eyes long and earnestly, the others holding their
breaths. Presently he said, without relaxing his gaze:

'Did you see mistily at first?' 'Yes.' 'Seeing at the periphery; but the centre being opaque?' 'Yes! How did you know? Why, I couldn't see'--see pointing to
Stephen--'Lady de Lannoy; though her face was right in front of me!' Dr. Hilton took his hands from his patient's shoulders and shook him
warmly by both hands:-

'I am glad, old fellow! It was worth waiting for, wasn't it? But I say,
it was a dangerous thing to take off those bandages before I permitted. However, it has done no harm! But it was lucky that I mistrusted your
patience and put the time for the experiment a week later than I thought
necessary . . . What is it?' He turned from one to the other
questioningly; there was a look on Harold's face that he did not quite
comprehend. 'H-s-h,' said the latter warningly, 'I'll tell you all about it . . . some time!' The awkward pause was broken by Pearl, who came to the Doctor and said:

'I must kiss you, you know. It was you who saved The Man's eyes. Stephen
has told me how you watched him!' The Doctor was somewhat taken aback;
as yet he was ignorant of Pearl's existence. However, he raised the
child in his arms and kissed her, saying:

'Thank you, my dear! I did all I could. But he helped much himself;
except at the very last. Don't you ever go and take off bandages, if you
should ever have the misfortune to have them on, without the doctor's
permission!' Pearl nodded her head wisely and then wriggled out of his
arms and came again to Harold, looking up at him protectingly and saying
in an old-fashioned way:

'How are you feeling now? None the worse, I hope, _Harold_!' The Man lifted her up and kissed her again. When he set her down she
came over to Lady de Lannoy and held up her arms to be lifted:

'And I must kiss you again too, Stephen!'