The presage of the afternoon sky was amply fulfilled by midnight. The western gale howled through the window bars and the sound of the sea's thunder rolled up from the beach. For the Mediterranean it was a gale beyond the normal, one that had borrowed strength from its Atlantic kin. It lashed the green islands of the archipelago with unaccustomed violence. The vine poles fell in ranks before its blast; the lava dust whirled up in spirals; the pebbles clattered along the face of the shingle. And yet there was something strange, noticeable, almost ominous, about the tempest. It had none of the northern breath of ice. It was a hot wind; in spring or summer, and had it risen in the south, one would have called it sirocco and kept in the shadow throughout its blowing. But this wind blew from the north and the month was December. The islanders mused over the phenomenon debatingly.

Inside the prison the storm muffled sounds which, however, no listener was abroad to detect. A common table fork his only implement, Aylmer was levering the massive corner-stones inch by inch from their seating. The lower one had already been removed, but the upper one, as expected, had not fallen from its place. He panted as he put forth his strength upon it. The ebb and flow of his pulses swelled in the half-healed scar on his temple. Blood was flowing from a few superficial cuts upon his fingers. He ground his teeth and tugged at the stone savagely, worrying it as a terrier might worry a defiant rat. And then, with an unexpected jerk, it fell out upon him bodily. He dropped backwards, the stone's weight upon his leg.

He gave a half-muffled cry, not of pain, but of satisfaction. The rest was easy; the road was open.

Then, as he panted in the relief of accomplished effort, Fate rebuked his satisfaction with a sudden threat. A step sounded coming up the gravel.

His temperamental coolness and presence of mind never stood a test better. He stood up, raised each stone in quick succession, and placed them swiftly, carefully, and silently beneath the coverlet of his companion's bed. She flung herself down beside them. He drew his own pallet into the corner from which the stones had been removed and lay, his face to the wall, the huddle of the bed clothes hiding the opening. A moment later a light shone through the window. The light of a lamp illuminated a wrinkled Italian face.

The watcher blinked at them suspiciously, grunted, and then with a half-articulate expression of satisfaction, turned away. The light bobbed slowly off into the distance, flaring and guttering before the force of the wind. Inside the prison a sigh went up—a chorussed echo of relief.

"Landon is taking no chances," said Aylmer, in a whisper. "We are to be visited, at intervals. That is evident."

He heard something like the sound of a sob in the darkness.

"It means defeat—this?" asked Claire. "Fate is setting her face against us. We are not even to have our chance!"

"No!" he said grimly. "Fate is not against us. I feel it, I have believed it all along. And if she is, then it is our duty to defy her. After all, we can use the chief source of danger to defeat suspicion; that is easy."

He rose cautiously and plucked the remaining stones from the hole. He placed them in his own bed; he arranged matters carefully. And then he made a motion towards the new-made opening.

"Will you lead?" he said quietly. "Will you be the first to confront—Fate?"

She gave a little gasp.

"I?" she said, and hesitated, fear in her eyes.

"You, if you will," he answered simply. "Make your way out and hide yourself in the nearest convenient shadow. Then, if he returns before I can join you, await me. If not—" He shrugged his shoulders. "I shall be at your heels."

She still paused, and her fingers clenched and unclenched.

"I did not expect—to be—separated," she breathed. "My strength—I did not realize it at first—is coming all from you."

His hand went out into the darkness and touched her.

"From now on, it will be used in your service," he said quietly. "For you and you alone." She felt the hand quiver. "Whether you ask it or not, whether I am to be all to you in the future, or nothing. It will be there—for your asking."

And then, because the need of that strength came upon her with a force which she could not control, she gripped the protecting hand between her fingers and—Fate alone knows why—raised it to her lips. The next instant she had slipped past him in the darkness and was drawing herself through the opening. She rose to her knees, to her feet. She stood out upon the wind-swept earth, free. Free of the material prison behind her. Had she not laid upon herself new bonds? It was a thought too new, too indefinite, too strangely sweet. The tumult of her feelings was in accord with the tumult of the night.

She gripped the protecting hand between her fingers

She stood, expectant, her ears alert for sounds. There was no grating of pebbles upon the path. But from the hole at her feet the faint rip of clothing torn against the angle of the stone. The next instant Aylmer had emerged, but did not rise. His hands, returning to the opening, still worked at something within. And then she gave a little gasp. A light shone at her feet. It made a tiny, yellow splash in the darkness and fell—on Aylmer's face.

Terror paralyzed her; she stood as if turned to stone; her hands clenched into her clothing upon her breast. And Aylmer lay as motionless, the golden gleam falling directly into his eyes, which did not even blink.

A sound broke the stillness—a sound which came from the far side of their prison—and the light disappeared. She heard footsteps which retreated; she recognized again the grunt which told of another inspection made to the inspector's content. But what had saved them—what?

Aylmer rose and stood beside her. His hand gently gripped her elbow and drew her out into the roar and beat of the tempest. He headed inland; the path which the sentinel had taken was the one which led towards the shore.

A minute later she breathed her question. And he laughed lightly in the darkness. The sound, incongruous as it seemed to her sense of ever-menacing fear, thrilled her strangely. If he could laugh, was not Fate laughing with him? Was there not a smile on the face of Hope?

"I was only just through the hole when he came, when he flashed his lantern at what he supposed was my body, recumbent on the bed. I was holding up the bed clothes from outside; I had not had time to shove the stones back into place."

She shuddered at the nearness of the hazard. Supposing the man had come at the very moment of escape—supposing?

"But the light?" she protested. "The light shone upon your face!"

He laughed again.

"The bed clothes had a hole in them!" he said. "I held them up into the form of human shoulders, and through a rent his lantern beat directly on my face! He could not, of course, see me, but I got a good view of him. It was Luigi himself, this time. Has Fate been whispering to him, do you think? Has she made him suspicious?"

She stumbled and caught at him to steady herself. He looked down in sudden, quick compunction.

"It has been too much for you!" he said anxiously. "You are feeling faint?"

"No!" she said quietly. "I am trying to think of it as a nightmare from which I shall wake directly, but it is real! Whenever that comes home to me it—it is a pain. Well, it will not be a long ordeal now, will it? We meet Fate at the landing stage, and she will give her decision. Can we unmoor the Santa Margarita from inside the breakwater, or can we not? She will know."

He nodded.

"In five minutes we, too, shall know. We are circling for the Marina now. A couple of hundred yards and we shall be there!"

They strode on into the darkness, with eyes and ears alert. They heard the battling of the waves against the stones of the tiny pier, but what they did not hear was the sound of singing cordage in the felucca's rigging.

Aylmer halted with a sudden, muffled exclamation.

"They have unshipped the mast!" he cried sharply, and this time she recognized, even in his voice, the note of defeat.

She echoed his exclamation; she followed at his heels as he ran out upon the little breakwater. No, there had been no room for mistake. The great mast with its cross spar lay along the stone flags. The hull was snugly berthed alongside it, within the tiny harbor. The dingy? There was none; they had cast it loose when they fled from the torpedo boat through the island channel.

For a moment he did not speak. He stood, looking silently at the dismantled boat, the raging sea, the swinging lights of a passing steamer. Then he turned and shook his head.

"To step that mast into place again is beyond one man's strength," he said. "To fling ourselves out into that whirl on a mastless hull is to court death inevitably. What is the alternative? We could stand in front of the shed here, screened from view inland, and signal some passing vessel with flares, if we had the means of making a light. That would not be a good chance, but it has possibilities."

"And I have matches!" she said eagerly. "I have my chatelaine still. I have even my purse yet. So far they have not robbed me."

He turned as she spoke and without comment ran back across the shingle. He began to pluck handfuls of the dry, bent grass which found a sparse livelihood in the belt of sand between the shore and the vineyards. He returned, rummaged among the litter around the shed, broke up some stray pieces of driftwood into chips, and thrust a lighted match among the bents. A flame shot up, passed from the tinder to the wood, and within a minute was a well-lit fire. He twisted the remaining handfuls of grass into spirals, wetted them slightly in the sea, and held them to the flame.

They burnt slowly with a red glow, as he swung them to and fro in the wind; in dashes, in dots, in circles, he spelled messages into the night, but no answering lantern or rocket came from the sea. And she watched apathetically. For her hope was dead again, the hand of Fate had closed. This was action; this helped them to avoid thinking, to avert anticipation, but success was a matter outside her calculations. The sense of nightmare closed down upon her again. The storm, the red flashes against the purple darkness, the wild unaccustomedness of everything heightened the illusion. But when would she wake? Ah, when would she wake?

And then—she rubbed her eyes. A light—surely this was no freak of her fevered eyesight?—danced into view within a couple of hundred yards of the shore. For a moment it swung to the lift and surge of the waves alone, but a moment later it rose half a dozen feet into the air, and flashed and circled as the charred torch in Aylmer's hand was circling—an answer to their message of despair. She gasped with eagerness; she cried aloud.

Was it fancy or did another cry reach them through the thunder of the waves?

The light stayed motionless for an instant, and then swung towards them. Whatever vessel was bearing it had turned its prow towards the shore. Aylmer caught up another glowing handful of bents and ran out to the breakwater's end. Claire's heart beat in suffocating throbs as she followed.

Again a cry reached them, and Aylmer waved his beacon vigorously. A sudden shaft of moonlight sank through a rift in the flying clouds.

They saw it then—a dark mass which plunged and heaved among the white crests, and drifted nearer and nearer. There was no sail set, but they could see the rise and fall of a couple of great oars which steadied the boat as it advanced by drifting only. It was less than a cable length distant now, passing through the ring of rocks which guarded the harbor entrance.

They held their breath. Ten seconds would do it, but ten seconds held an infinitude of possibilities. If the boat broached to, if its prow, indeed, deflected a couple of yards from the course, would not that give Fate a chance to fling her scorn upon their rising hopes? Their eyes were strained. Claire's hand was clenched till her nails seemed to sink into the flesh of her palm. And then she gave a sigh of relief. The boat had passed the outer rock, was heading straight for the inner harbor and the calm.

Fate laughed harshly.

A gust stormed in from the sea, caught the boat's prow, swung it, caused the port side rower to meet its strength too swiftly with his own. They heard a crack—heard it distinctly above the uproars of the gale. The oar had broken between the thole-pins; the rower was down.

There was another crashing sound, louder this time, and menacing. A great sea raced beneath the laboring keel, lifted it, shook it, and flung it aside, full upon the rock. The white gleam of the new-made splinters reached them through the smother of the foam fifty yards away.

Aylmer cried out and raced back along the stones. His hands plucked at the cordage which was folded about the felucca's mast, and drew out a rope. He came back at speed, unwinding the coils as he came. He thrust the loose end into her hands.

"Get a purchase against a stone and then hold on—hold on!" he ordered. He flung off his coat.

She cried out in protest; she clung to him.

"No!" she cried. "No!"

Very gently, very firmly, her hand was drawn aside. He bent over her; something touched faintly—very faintly—her lips. The next instant she was alone. He had leaped—far out into the grip of the tide.

She caught her breath and clutched the rope; she flung herself down and wedged her limbs behind a boulder. Fate was relentless, she told herself, was cruel beyond even her darkest anticipations. For now her one support was to be denied her; she was to be left alone. She set her lips grimly. No, she would never see Aylmer again, but she would defy Fate! She was to be crushed, but she would go down fighting; she would be worthy of herself—and of him.

The vagrant shaft of moonlight was gone again; the darkness was well-nigh impenetrable. The rope swung between her fingers unstraining. The minutes passed one by one; the tension of expectancy plucked at her nerves; she shivered, but not with cold. Even if it was the worst that was to come upon her she wanted to know—to know.

The rope grew taut.

It was as if an electric shock thrilled her. She braced herself against the stone, and her muscles tightened; slowly, using her strength to its utmost but with steady effort, she began to haul it in foot by foot. It came heavily but unceasingly, the coils unwinding fathom after fathom at her side.

And then the strain ceased as suddenly as it had begun. A voice hailed her out of the darkness, almost at her feet. A dark bulk rose at the breakwater's edge.

Aylmer staggered towards her and laid something on the stones—something which stirred uneasily but unavailingly, clogged, as it seemed, by the weight of its sodden clothing.

She knelt beside it. She brushed the lank hair from a dripping face.

Aylmer waved her back.

"There is another!" he shouted. "Hold on if you can! Hold on!" and so plunged back into the surf. For the second time she braced herself to endure the strain—to wait—to agonize with expectation. And again Fate played with her, racked her between hope and fear, drew out the strain and then, as suddenly, relaxed it. Aylmer crept out upon the stones, gasping, doggedly clinging to a new burden.

This time it was the bearer who staggered and fell, the burden who rose unsteadily, and peered into his rescuer's face.

She dropped upon her knees beside him. Pale, clean-cut ascetic features were lifted to hers. Two dark brown eyes inspected her with startled incredulity.

And then the man rose and—the act was instinctive, it was obvious—doffed his hat.

"Signora," he said in Italian. "Signora! This is Salicudi, is it not? I am at a loss—I do not understand."

For a moment she hesitated, looking at him. The long black garment which clung about him reached to his feet. Suddenly she recognized it, and, with recognition, a little cry escaped her. It was a soutane. And this was no sailor. She was confronted by a priest.

As she opened her lips to find a reply, something clattered behind her; something rushed, calling upon the names of innumerable saints, out of the darkness, and seized her shoulder. A harsh voice rang into the echoes of the night.

"To me—to me, all of you! They are escaping! Blood of My Lady, the prisoners are loose!"

The man in the soutane whirled fiercely upon the newcomer. And as he turned the moon broke through the scurry of the drift and fell upon the group in cold brilliance.

"Prisoners!" The voice was incredulous, wrathful, and above all full of command. "Prisoners! You speak of—whom?"

The hand upon Claire's shoulder dropped. Her captor fell away as if struck by a physical blow.

"Padre Sigi!" he stammered, and his voice was convincing of his amazement. "Padre Sigi!"

The other nodded imperiously.

"Padre Sigismondi," he agreed. "At your service, my good Luigi. At your service!"