appealing in pity to him for permission to share
his agony.

He lifted the flowers to his lips and kissed the stems where her hand
had clasped them; then bowed his head, his strong shoulders against the
bars.

"Joe!" Her voice was a whisper in his ear, more than pity in it, so it
seemed to him in the revelation of that moment; more than entreaty, more
than consolation.

Her hand was on his arm; he turned to her, shaking the fallen locks of
his wild hair back from his brow. Then her hand was in his, and there
was a warm mist, as of summer clouds, before his eyes. Her face was
before him, and near--so near. Not red like the bitter-sweet, but pale
as the winter dawn. Her eyes were wide, her chin was lifted, and he was
straining her to him with the jail door bars against his breast.

Love comes that way, and death; and the blow of sorrow; and the wrench
of life's last bitter pang. Only life is slow; tedious and laggard with
its burdens and its gleams.

He remembered in a moment; the pressure of the bars against his breast
recalled him to his sad estate. He released her hand and fell back a
step from her, a sharp cry on his lips as if he had seen her crushed and
mangled just beyond his reach.

"I didn't mean to do that, Alice; I didn't mean to do that!" said he,
dropping to his knees before her as if struck down by a stunning blow.
He bowed his head in contrite humiliation.

"I forgot where I was, Alice; I forgot!"

There was no displeasure in her face as she stood panting before the
barred door, her hands to her heaving breast, her head thrown back. Her
lips were parted; there was a light of exaltation in her eyes, as of one
who has felt the benediction of a great and lasting joy. She put her
hand through the bars again, and touched his bowed head.

"Don't do that, Joe," said she.

The sheriff's key sounded in the lock of the corridor gate.

"Time's up," he called.

"All right; I'm coming," Alice returned.

Joe stood, weak and trembling. He felt as if he had, in the heat of some
great passion, rashly risked life, and more than life; that he had only
now dragged his battered body back to the narrow, precarious ledge from
which he had leaped, and that safety was not his.

"I must go now," said she, soft and low and in steady voice. "Good-bye."

She gave him her hand, and he clung to it like a nestling fastening upon
the last branch interposing between it and destruction.

"I forgot where I was," said he we