g!" he flung out in an access of pain. "Or
throw it down the khud. I said it would bring bad luck."

She sighed. "All the same--poor thing! It's too lovely...."

"Well then, don't wear it; but keep it"--his tone changed--"as a
reminder. We have been something to one another ... if it couldn't be
everything."

Her eyes were still lowered, her lips not quite steady.

"You've been ... very near it to me. Yet--it seemed, the more ... I
cared, the less I could get over ... that. And I felt as if
you--wouldn't get over.. Lance."

"My God! It's been a bitter, contrary business all round! I can't bear
hurting you. And--the talk and all that----" She nodded. For her that
was not the least bitter part of it all. "And you----? Oh, Lord--will
it be Hayes to the fore again?"

"_No!_" Reproach underlay her vehemence. "Mother may rage. I shall go
with Dolly Smyth to Kashmir.--And you----?"

"Oh, I'll go out to Narkhanda."

"Alone? But you're ill. You want looking after."

"Can't be helped. Azim Khan's a treasure. And really I don't care a damn
what comes to me."

"Oh, but _I_ do----!"

It was a cry from her heart. The strain of repression snapped. She
swayed, just perceptibly----

In a moment his arms were round her; and they clung together a long
while, in the only complete form of nearness they had known....

For Roy, that last passionate kiss was dead-sea fruit. For Rose, it was
her moment of completest surrender to an elemental force she had
deliberately played with only to find herself the sport of it at
last....

When it was over--all was over. Words were impertinent. He held her
hands close, a moment, looking into her tear-filled eyes. Then he took
up hat and stick and stumbled blindly down the verandah steps....

* * * * *

Back in his bachelor room at the Club, he realised that fever was on him
again: his eyeballs burning; little hammers beating all over his head.
Mechanically, he picked up two letters that lay awaiting him: one from
his father, one from Jeffers, congratulating him, in rather guarded
phrases, on his engagement to Miss Arden.

It was the last straw.

END OF PHASE IV.

PHASE V.

A STAR IN DARKNESS

CHAPTER I.

"Thou art with life
Too closely woven, nerve with nerve intwined;
Service still craving service, love for love ...
Nor yet thy human task is done."
--R.L.S.