rimony, yet coveted by men. Do you realize the
temptation----"

The man half rose in his irritation. "You're not answering my question."
The violence in his tone was unmistakeable. "What I've got to find out
is, what put you up to persuading her to live as though Pollock were not
dead?"

"I was coming to that." Tabs spoke reassuringly. "Beneath all her gayety
I found, when I began to know her, that she was desperate--desperate to
live in the sunshine and mortally afraid of shadows. At the least hint
of shadows she grew reckless. She believed that her happiness was in the
past. So I taught her to play a game--a game that has often saved me
from despair. It was just this--to act as though all the goodness one
has known still lies ahead; in her case this meant living as though the
man whom she had loved were not dead, but waiting for her round some
future corner. So that was why---- But I think I've answered your
question."

Tabs rose from the couch and limped over to the empty fireplace. He
stood there beneath the portrait of Lady Dawn, supporting himself with
one arm against the mantel. The room was beginning to fill with dusk.
Beyond the threshold of the open window, the rockery-garden was still
vaguely golden. The little pond was a silver mirror.

Perhaps two minutes had elapsed. Uncertainly the stranger struggled to
his feet. He moved towards the door, halted and came slowly back. He
looked very spent, and slim, and wasted in the gathering shadows. As
Tabs gazed down at him, he noticed that his face was prodigiously
solemn.

"I don't mind now." He swallowed like a small boy getting rid of his
emotion. "I don't mind Gervis or Lockwood any longer; it's as though
they'd never happened. And I don't feel hard to her, the way I might
have. I'm glad you told her about things being round the corner. Because
I'm Pollock. I have come back."

Tabs stared at him. He was deeply moved. To humor him in his delusion
seemed the height of callousness. Yet what else was possible under the
circumstances?

"Of course you're Pollock," he assured him gently. "One wouldn't
recognize you from your portraits, but I ought to have guessed."

The man caught the deception in his tone. He lifted up his puzzled gray
eyes. "You don't---- No, I see you don't. You don't believe me. Yet I am
Pollock."

"My dear chap," Tabs said it coaxingly, "I don't see why you should
think I doubt you. I'm quite certain you're Pollock--Reggie Pollock, the