arm and lay there warm against Roddy's side.

"What's the use?" The Creature was close to him, his breath warm and
damp like the night air. "She doesn't care for you. You can see that she
doesn't. She's been in love with her cousin for ever so long, only you
didn't know. Wouldn't she have told you that she was a friend of his if
there had been nothing more than that in it? What a fool you are--lying
here all broken up, simply in the way of her happiness, no good to
yourself or anyone else."

"I wish the thunder would come and smash you up...." Then, more
desperately, "What if that's right? if I were to clear out...."

"After all," said the Creature, "you've never before seen yourself as
you really are. You thought that you were all right because you could
use your legs and arms. Now you know what you are--You're nothing--only
something that many people must trouble to keep alive--useless--useless!
Why not?"

Yes, Roddy did see himself to-night, sternly; as in the old days he
might have looked upon someone and judged him unfit, so now he would
confront himself. "It's quite true. You've got nothing--nothing to show,
you've no intellect, you're selfish, you despise all kinds of people for
all kinds of reasons. You've stood a little pain--so can any man. You'd
better get out--no one will know."

"Yes," said the Creature, very close to him now. "You can do it so
easily. That morphia that you've had once or twice--an overdose. No one
would suppose.... She would never know, and you'd be rid for ever of all
this wrong and you'd free so many people from so much trouble."

"Jacob, my son," he whispered, "do you hear what they're saying?"

He went right down, down to the depths of a pit that closed about his
head, filled his eyes with darkness, was suffocating.

"Yes, he's beaten," he heard them say. "We've succeeded at last. We've
succeeded...."

But they had not.

With an effort of will that was beyond any power that he had believed
himself to possess, he pulled himself up.

"There's one thing you've forgotten." He gasped as he came struggling
up.

He took the Creature in his hands, wrung its neck and flung it out of
the window.

"There's one thing you've forgotten. There's my love for her. That's
strong enough for anything. That's reason enough for living even though
she doesn't want it. I'll beat you all with that ... go back to hell,
the lot of you."

II

"I must never let it happen like that again. Wha