of the man who ruled there and over the little neighbourhood,
a tyrant and a despot. The misery of those days laid hold of him, He
turned away from the railings and walked Strandwards, past the door of
his lodgings and round many side streets, grimy and unpretentious. He
walked like a man possessed, but his memories had taken firm hold of
him, shadowy but inexorcisable fiends. It was Cicely now who was
walking by his side, and his heart was beating with something of the old
stir. What a change her coming had made in that strange corner of the
world. Cicely, with her dainty figure and bright, sunny smile,
wonderfully light-hearted, a gleam of brilliant colour thrown across
their grey life. She loved poetry too, the hills, the sunsets, and
those long walks across the purple moorland. It was a wonderful
companionship into which they had drifted. He was her refuge in a life
which she frankly declared to be insupportable. She was a revelation to
him--the first he had had--of delicate femininity, full ever of
suggestions of that wonderful world beyond, of which at that time he had
only dared to dream. It was she who had kindled his ambitions, who had
preached to him silently, but with convincing eloquence, of the glories
of freedom, the heritage of his manhood. And all the while Joan, from
apart, was watching them. No word crossed her lips, yet often on their
return from a day's rambling he caught a look in her eyes which amazed
him. Gideon Strong went his way unseeing, stern, and unbending as ever
even to his younger daughter, but in those days there was thunder always
in the air. Douglas remembered the sensation and shuddered. Once he
had come across Joan and her sister together suddenly, and had found it
hard work to keep from a shriek of terror. There was a light in Joan's
eyes--it seemed to him that he had seen it there often lately. Was
there another Joan whom he did not know?

He walked on, grim, pale, chilled. The time when he would lie awake in
his little oak-beamed chamber and thoughts of Cicely would soothe him to
sleep with pleasant fancies was gone. He thought of her now without
emotion--no longer the memory of those walks thrilled his pulses. He
knew very well that never again would his heart beat the quicker for her
coming, never again, even though the memory of that terrible night could
be swept away, would her coming bring joy to him. Firmly though his
feet were planted upon the ladder, it seemed to him then