as though he had come suddenly to the edge of a great danger;
somewhere within him an intelligence seized upon it and understood. Yet
it was not physical enough for him to fight. It was a danger which
crept up and about him, something which he could not see or touch and
yet which made his heart beat faster and the blood come into his face.
It drew him, triumphed over him, dragged his hand forth until his
fingers closed upon a lacy, crumpled bit of a handkerchief that lay on
the edge of the piano keys. It was the woman's handkerchief, and like a
thief he raised it slowly. It smelled faintly of crushed violets; it
was as if she were bending over him in his sickness again, and it was
her breath that came to him. He was not thinking of her as St. Pierre's
wife. And then sharply he caught himself and placed the handkerchief
back on the piano keys. He tried to laugh at himself, but there was an
emptiness where a moment before there had been that thrill of which he
was now ashamed.

He turned back to the window. The thunder had come nearer. It was
coming up fast out of the west, and with it a darkness that was like
the blackness of a pit. A dead stillness was preceding it now, and in
that stillness it seemed to Carrigan that he could hear the soapy,
slitting sound of the streaming flashes of electrical fire that
blazoned the advance of the storm. The camp-fires across the river were
dying down. One of them went out as he looked at it, and he stared into
the darkness as if trying to pierce distance and gloom to see what sort
of a shelter it was that St. Pierre's wife had over there. And there
came over him in these moments a desire that was almost cowardly. It
was the desire to escape, to leave behind him the memory of the rock
and of St. Pierre's wife, and to pursue once more his own great
adventure, the quest of Black Roger Audemard.

He heard the rain coming. At first the sound of it was like the
pattering of ten million tiny feet in dry leaves; then, suddenly, it
was like the roar of an avalanche. It was an inundation, and with it
came crash after crash of thunder, and the black skies were illumined
by an almost uninterrupted glare of lightning. It had been a long time
since Carrigan had felt the shock of such a storm. He closed the window
to keep the rain out, and after that stood with his face flattened
against the glass, staring over the river. The camp-fires were all gone
now, blotted out like so many candles snuffed