e went to his wife's room. It was
locked. Then he walked down to his mines with a miserable shame and
anger at his heart. He did not pass The Crimson Flag. He went by another
way.

That evening, in the dusk, a woman knocked at Tom Liffey's door. He
opened it.

"Are you alone"? she said. "I am alone, lady."

"I will come in," she added. "You will--come in"? he faltered.

She drew near him, and reached out and gently caught his hand.

"Ah!" he said, with a sound almost like a sob in its intensity, and the
blood flushed to his hair.

He stepped aside, and she entered. In the light of the candle her
eye burned into his, but her face wore a shining coldness. She leaned
towards him.

"You said you could worship me," she whispered, "and you cursed him.
Well--worship me--altogether--and that will curse him, as he has killed
me."

"Dear lady!" he said, in an awed, overwhelmed murmur; and he fell back
to the wall.

She came towards him. "Am I not beautiful"? she urged. She took his
hand. His eye swam with hers. But his look was different from hers,
though he could not know that. His was the madness of a man in a dream;
hers was a painful thing. The Furies dwelt in her. She softly lifted
his hand above his head, and whispered: "Swear." And she kissed him.
Her lips were icy, though he did not think so. The blood tossed in his
veins. He swore: but, doing so, he could not conceive all that would be
required of him. He was hers, body and soul, and she had resolved on a
grim thing.... In the darkness, they left the hut and passed into the
woods, and slowly up through the hills.

Heldon returned to his home that night to find it empty. There were
no servants. There was no wife. Her cat and dog lay dead upon the
hearthrug. Her clothing was cut into strips. Her wedding-dress was a
charred heap on the fireplace. Her jewellery lay molten with it. Her
portrait had been torn from its frame.

An intolerable fear possessed him. Drops of sweat hung on his forehead
and his hands. He fled towards the town. He bit his finger-nails till
they bled as he passed the house in the pines. He lifted his arm as if
the flappings of The Crimson Flag were blows in his face.

At last he passed Tom Liffey's hut. He saw Pierre, coming from it.
The look on the gambler's face was one, of gloomy wonder. His fingers
trembled as he lighted a cigarette, and that was an unusual thing. The
form of Heldon edged within the light. Pierre dropped the match an