HE woke with a racking headache and nerves like wire that is stretched to snapping point. He made a pretense of breakfast, not daring to ask after Marie. He was afraid to go out for fear he should return to find her gone. He went into the library and tried to read the newspaper, and fell asleep over it, waking with a start when the gong for lunch rang through the house, to find Miss Chester standing beside him.

"My dear boy! Are you ill that you fall asleep at such an hour?" she asked anxiously.

He managed to laugh.

"I was late last night," he apologized.

"Marie has one of her bad headaches, too," the old lady said. "She is not strong, you know, Chris. I wish you could persuade her to go away for a rest. I've been to her room twice, and she won't let me in. Have you seen her this morning?"

He had to lie to comfort her.

"Yes—she's all right—she'll be better when she's had a rest."

He went up to her door twice during the afternoon, but came away without daring to knock. He could hear her moving about inside, and once the shutting of a drawer.

He went down again and wrote a note to her. Would she see him just for a moment? He would not worry her, but he must see her. He slipped it under the door of her room, but though he waited about all the evening no answer came.

257 His head was unbearable then, and, feeling as if the pain would drive him mad, he took his hat and went out after dinner.

From her window Marie saw him go down the street. She had been watching all day for him to leave the house, and she drew a sharp breath as she saw his tall figure turn the corner of the road. She wondered if she would ever see him again. For a moment the thought stabbed her heart with a little pain, but it was gone instantly, and she crossed the room and quietly unlocked the door.

It was very quiet, and she slipped downstairs and out of the house without being seen.

It was almost dark now, and nobody noticed her as she went down the road and hailed a taxicab.

She gave the driver Feathers' address in Albany Street, then sat back in a corner, trembling and shaking in every limb.

There was a queer rapture in her heart, which was yet half fear. She was going to be happy, she told herself, fiercely; she was going to offer herself to a man who loved her and who would make her happy, and yet it terrified her to know that she was deliberately cutting herself off from her old life.

She tried not to think, not to reason. Since yesterday her heart had been like a stone and she dreaded that its hardness should melt.

The door of the house was open when the taxicab stopped, and a woman stood at the entrance looking out into the night.

Marie spoke to her timidly.

"Is Mr. Dakers in, please?"

The woman's eyes scanned her white face interestedly.

"I think he is," she said. "Do you know which are his rooms, or shall I take you up?"

"Thank you; I know." She had never been in the house before, but she had heard a great deal about his rooms from Chris, and she went up the staircase in the darkness, her heart shaken with a wild sort of happiness, and reached the landing above.

The door of Feathers' sitting-room stood open, and he was standing 258 at the table in his old tweed jacket, packing some papers away in a box.

He had not heard Marie's step, and he did not move or glance up till she was actually in the room and had whispered his name.

"Mr. Dakers!"

He started then as if he had heard a voice from the dead. He had been thinking of her a moment ago, and his face was white as he stared at her across the table. Then he took a swift step forward.

"Mrs. Lawless! Good heavens! Is anything the matter?"

He drew her into the room and closed the door.

"Chris? Where is he?" he asked hoarsely.

"I've told him I can't live with him any more"

She broke down into stifled sobbing. "I've done my best—you know I have—and now it's finished. We had a dreadful scene last night . . . and I can't go back to him again—I can't."

Feathers tried to speak. Twice he moistened his lips and tried to speak, but no words would come. The room was rocking before him. The night was full of tempting voices whispering that she had come to him because she loved him, and because she knew he loved her.

With a desperate effort he found his voice.

"You don't mean what you are saying, I know, Mrs. Lawless; you are tired and upset. Let me see Chris, and if there is any little trouble that can be put right he will listen to me." He held out his hand to her. "Let me take you home."

"It can never be all right again," she said, her voice broken with sobbing. "He never cared for me, you know he never did . . ."

Feathers interrupted gently.

"But you love him. My dear, I know that you have always loved him."

Marie looked up, the tears wet on her cheeks, her sobbing suddenly quiet. "Do you know what I told him?" she asked, and then, as he did not answer, she added in a whisper: "I told him that I loved you."

258 It seemed to Feathers as if all the world stood still in that moment—as if he and Marie were alone in a great silence, looking into one another's eyes.

His heart was thumping up in his throat, almost choking him, and his hands were clenched in the pockets of his shabby tweed jacket.

The light in the center of the room fell full on his ugly face, cruelly revealing all its grimness and pallor, and the trembling tenderness of his mouth. He made no attempt to ignore her meaning. It was too great a moment for pretense.

She was so small, such a child, that his passionate love died down into something infinitely gentle as he spoke.

"Do you know what it means, Marie? Do you realize that you will break Miss Chester's heart, and ruin your husband's life? Do you know what everyone will say of you and me?"

She broke in feverishly.

"I don't mind what they say. I've never had any happiness, and I could be happy with you—I am always happy with you . . . Oh, I thought you loved me," she added with a broken little cry.

It seemed a long time before he answered, and then he said in a voice that was slow and labored with emotion:

"I love you as the sweetest and dearest woman I have ever met. I love you for your kind friendship to me, and because you did not shrink from my ugly face. I love you because you're as far above me in goodness and purity as the stars." He stopped with a hard breath before he went on again. "You've been my ideal of everything I hold sacred, and you are asking me to trample it all underfoot and drag it in the mud."

He broke off jaggedly, and Marie said in a whisper:

"If—if you love me like that, don't you know—can't you see—how happy we could be together?"

Did he know? He had dreamed so often of an impossible future in which she might be his, of long days spent with her, and hours of contentment, of the touch of her lips on his, and the sound of her footsteps pacing beside him for the rest of his life and hers; but 260 they had only been dreams—dreams that could never come true.

He sought desperately in his mind for words with which to answer her appeal, but what poor things were mere words in comparison with his longing to take her in his arms and kiss the smiles back to her tremulous lips.

And she said again desperately, fighting for her ground inch by inch:

"Chris never loved me. It was only the money he wanted . . . oh, you know it was!"

It was hard to find a reply to such an unanswerable argument.

"Years ago, before I knew you, Marie," Feathers said presently, "Chris saved me from what might have been lifelong disgrace. He was the best friend a man ever had. What would you think of me if I paid my debt to him by taking his wife? Oh, my dear, think what it would mean . . ."

She thought she heard a note of yielding in his voice, and she reached out a trembling hand and put it into his.

"If you go away I shall have nobody left. Oh, I can't bear you to go away!"

He kept the little hand in his very gently. He went on talking to her as if she had been a child. He tried to show her the tragic impossibility of it all—the hopelessness. He spoke to her of the past, of the days when she and Chris has been children together; he pleaded for his friend as eloquently as he might have pleaded for himself, and at last he stopped, struck to the heart by her silence.

She drew her hand away.

"You mean . . . all this means . . . that you don't love me."

Feathers bit his lip till the blood came. Not love her! When every drop of blood in his body was on fire with love for her; when he was holding himself in with a grip of iron from taking her into his arms. He laughed drearily as he answered:

261 "If I loved you less I should not try to send you away."

She looked up then, the blood rushing in a crimson wave to her face. He knew he had but to say the word and she would leave everything for him, and the knowledge tore his heart with pride and humility. He knew he had but to hold out his arms and she would come to them as a child might, trusting him, confident of happiness.

And it was because she was such a child that he would not, dare not! She did not understand what she was doing, he kept telling himself. She did not realize into what a pitiful trap she was trying to lead both him and herself. His heart ached with tenderness for her, even while it bled with the wounds of the battle he was fighting.

There were moments when nothing seemed to matter but this girl and her wistful eyes—moments when honor was but a paltry rag, and friendship a thing at which to scoff—moments when he told himself that he had as much right to happiness as anyone in the world, and that it was here for the taking—moments when he would have sold his immortal soul to hold her to his heart and kiss her lips. He felt his resistance breaking down, and in despair he broke out:

"Mrs. Lawless, let me take you home . . . I beg of you—for both our sakes . . ."

She stood quite still, her hands tearing at her gloves, then suddenly she looked up at him with burning eyes.

He could read the thoughts behind those eyes—shame that he was sending her away, and shame because she had come. Feathers stifled a groan as he turned from her.

Then—"I am quite ready," she said, in the faintest whisper.

He stood aside to let her pass, but as she reached him she swayed and would have fallen fainting to the floor but for his arms.

He caught her and held her as if she had been a child Her eyes were closed, and her face and lips quite colorless.

262 Feathers put her down in the shabby armchair in which Chris had so often sat and grumble and tried to force water between her lips.

Her hat had fallen off, and there was an ugly bruise on her forehead where last night she had fallen against the window sill. It stood out painfully against the whiteness of her skin.

And suddenly Feathers' strength gave way. He gathered her into his arms as if he could never let her go. He kissed her hair and the ugly bruise that had broken him down. He kissed her hands and the unconscious face that rested against his shabby coat.

For a moment at least she was his—even if in all his life he never saw her again.

Even Samson was robbed of his strength by a woman.

And even as he held her Feathers felt her stir in his arms, and the fluttering of her breath, and he released her a little, watching the color creep back to her face with passionate eyes.

Then her lids lifted, and she saw him bending over her.

She struggled free of him and sat up, pushing the dark hair from her forehead. She tried to remember what had happened, but it only came back to her slowly and with difficulty; then she made a movement to rise to her feet.

"I forgot . . . you asked me to go . . ."

"Marie!" said Feathers brokenly.

She looked up, a wild hope in her eyes, then she fell forward into his arms.

"Oh, do you love me?—say you love me . . ."

"My darling—my beloved . . ."

Everything was forgotten. The world was at a standstill. In his arms she felt that she had come home at last to rest and perfect happiness.

They talked in broken whispers. He would take her away, he said; they would find their happiness together. Between kisses they made their plans.

"And you will never be sorry—and hate me?" she asked painfully.

He turned her face to his.

"Am I to answer that question?" he asked hoarsely, and she shook 263 her head. "No—I know you never will."

Her head was on his shoulder, his cheek pressed to hers. Presently she raised herself, and put her arms round his neck.

"Are you quite—quite happy?" she whispered. The grip of his arms left her breathless as he answered:

"I never believed in heaven—till now." She rubbed her soft face against the rough tweed of his coat.

"I love your coat," she said. "I love all of you."

Feathers turned his face sharply away, and she put up her hand, forcing him to look at her again.

"Do you really love me?" she asked. She had had so little of love in her life, it was hard to believe that at last she was everything in the world to this man.

He answered her with broken words and kisses. She could feel the passionate beating of his heart beneath her cheek, and she looked up at him with shy eyes. "You always will—always!" she insisted.

"Always—always . . . all my life—and after."

He put his lips to hers in a long kiss; he kissed her hands and slender wrists.

"My love—my love," he said brokenly, and could say no more.

Presently he drew her to her feet

"I must take you home." He looked at her with eyes that were hot and passionate. "Marie, do you despise me? I tried to send you away, but I love you so, I love you so."

"I love you, too," she said.

"My beloved."

She looked up at him.

"It's good-night then?" She lifted her face like a child to kiss him. "Good-night till to-morrow," she said. "And then . . ."

He kissed the words from her lips.

She tidied her hair by the little glass over the mantel-shelf.

"My cheeks burn so," she said shyly. She had never before been kissed as Feathers had kissed her.

Her eyes fell on a photograph of Chris as she turned away. Chris at 264 his handsomest and happiest, his eyes meeting hers with the old smiling carelessness, and she felt as if a cold hand had clutched her heart.

Until now she had forgotten Chris! She had forgotten everything.

She turned quickly to the man behind her.

"I am quite ready." She was only anxious now to go.

He kissed her again on the dark stairs, very humbly and reverently, and he kept her hand in his as they walked together along the street.

"Is it very late?" she asked once, and he said: "No—only ten; do you think they will have missed you?"

"I locked my door; they will think I am asleep. Greyson will let me in."

He clenched his teeth in the darkness. Already the lying and subterfuge had begun. Where was it going to end? He could feel shame like a mantle on his broad shoulders.

He said good-night to her at the end of the street, following her slowly till she was safe indoors. Then he turned and walked back to his rooms. His head was burning, and he took off his hat to bare it to the cool night air. He did not know if he was more happy than he had ever been in his life before, or unutterably wretched.

The thought of her kisses made his head reel, but the shame of his own pitiable weakness was like a searing flame.

265 He had said that he would take her away to-morrow. He was going to cut her off from everything she had held dear, and make her a nameless outcast! He was prepared to bring his idol down to the dust at his feet.

Looking back on the last hour, it seemed impossible he had yielded to such delirium. He had arranged every detail for her, had written them down so she could not forget, and at this time to-morrow . . .

He could not pass that thought. He stood still in the cool night and looked up at the stars.

"God, it can never be!" he told himself despairingly.

He had said that she was as far above him as the stars, and here he was in his madness trying to bring a star down to earth.

It was not of himself he thought at all. He would have gloried in a shame shared with her; but for Marie, little Marie Celeste . . .

He went up to his rooms with dragging steps. There was a light shining through the half-closed door, and he supposed vaguely that he must have left it burning when he went out.

He pushed open the door, and saw Chris sitting in the chair where so short a time ago he had held Marie in his arms.

266