Till this minute Dorothea had never doubted of success. But now? Dead or alive, if she fell into German hands, it would be equally fatal; Denis would be worse off than if she had never interfered. He might even owe his death to her. "Oh, darling, darling!" Dorothea murmured, crushing her hands together, an agonizing stricture at her heart. "Oh, it isn't fair. Oh, God, let me save him! Oh, I must save him, I can't _bear_ it if he dies through me, I can't, I can't, I _can't_. Oh, isn't there any, _any_ way?"
Pieces of rock, loosened by the explosion, were still pattering down; one fell on her hand. She glanced round impatiently, and saw to her dismay that half the cave seemed ready to fall in; very little more would bring down an avalanche. She sprang to her feet--and stood still. She had seen how to save Denis.
So simple, after all! Why, of course it was what always happened, in the ordinary course of operations. So much neater, too, than if she had escaped. The search would come to an end, the roads would no longer be guarded, Denis would have a far better chance of getting off. And there would certainly be nothing left to identify. Oh, it was a topping idea! Perhaps if Denis crossed the frontier into Holland she might follow--no, she couldn't, though, she was forgetting; how queer! She would be dead.
Death. She was going to die, all alone here in the dark. She would never see the sunshine any more. She would never see Denis any more, never be his wife, never taste the happiness which niggard Fate, at long last, was offering her. It was the end. And while she was trying to subdue her aching, unsatisfied rebellion, to remind herself that she had only petitioned to be allowed to save him and should be thankful, in a flash of sunset light which illumined and interpreted the past, Dorothea saw that it was the only perfect end. She would have been his wife? Ah, but it would never have been the same, he would never have given her what he once gave; she had spoiled that. It would have been pity, amends, the second best. He would never, never love her living; no, but he would love her dead. For her sake he would go softly all his days; she was sure, now, of an unfading shrine in his memory. Yes, and even apart from Denis, little Dorothea was shyly proud. She was not giving her life for him alone; she was dying as a soldier for her country, and could claim the soldier's due of amnesty and an honored grave.