ot move her limbs any
more. Her eyes opened and looked into his, very close, but his were
shut. The mask was gone. The man's whole soul was in his agonized face,
and his arm shook with her. Her mind was clear and she understood. She
was still herself, acting her play out in the teeth of death.

"I could not live," she said. "I could not be a millstone, dragging you
down, watching you as you killed yourself in working for me. It was to
be one of us. It was better so."

In his agony he laid his head beside hers on the pillow.

"Gloria--for Christ's sake--don't leave me--" The deep moan came from
his tortured heart.

"Bring--the child--Walter--" she said very faintly.

Even in death she could not bear to be alone with him. He straightened
himself, stood up, and saw the light fading in her eyes. Then, indeed, a
shiver ran through her and shook her. Then the lids opened wide, and she
cried out loudly.

"Quick--I am going--"

Rather than that she should not have what she wished, he tore himself
away and wrenched the door open, forgetting that it was locked.

"Bring the child!" he cried, into the face of old Nanna, who was
standing there, and he pushed her towards the door of the other room
with one hand, while he already turned back to Gloria.

He started, for she was sitting up, with wide eyes and outstretched
hands, gazing at the patch of sunlight on the floor. Dying, she saw the
awful vision of her dream again, rising stiff and stark from the bricks
to its upright horror between her and the light. Her hands pointed at it
and shook, and her jaw dropped, but she was motionless as she sat.

Nanna, sobbing, came in suddenly, holding up the little child straight
before her, that it might see its mother before she was gone forever.
The baby hands feebly beat its little sides, and it gasped for breath.

Words came from Gloria's open mouth, articulate, clear, but very far in
sound.

"An evil death on you and all your house!" the words said, as though
spoken by another.

The outstretched hands sank slowly, as the vision laid itself down
before her, straight and corpse-like. The beautiful head fell back upon
Griggs's arm, and the eyes met his.

[Illustration: "The last great, true note died away."--Vol. II., p.
219.]

Nanna prayed aloud, holding up the child mechanically, and the small
eyes were fixed, horrorstruck, upon the bed. A low cry trembled in the
air. Stefanone, his hat in his hand, stood against the door