ing to die and wants to ask your forgiveness
or something of that sort."

"I will go to her at once," I said quietly. As I moved toward the door
my knees trembled so I could hardly walk.

Lillian came up to me quickly and put her strong arm around me.

We went down the hall to a wonderful room of ivory and gold, which I
knew must be Lillian's guest room. In a big ivory-tinted bed the girl
lay, a pitiful wreck of the dashing, insolent figure she had been.

Her face was as white as the pillows upon which she lay, while her
hands looked utterly bloodless as they rested listlessly upon the
coverlet. Only her eyes held anything of her old spirit. They looked
unusually brilliant. I wondered uneasily if their appearance was the
result of their contrast to her deathly white face or whether the
fever which the doctor dreaded had set in.

She looked at me steadily for a long minute, then spoke huskily--I was
surprised at the strength of her voice.

"Of course I have no right to ask anything of you, Mrs. Graham," she
said, "but death, you know, always has privileges, and I am going to
die."

I saw the nurse glance swiftly, sharply, at her, and then go quietly
out of the room.

"She's hurrying to get the doctor," the girl said, with the uncanny
intuition of the very sick, "but he can't do me any good. I'm going to
die and I know it. And I want you to promise to stay with me until the
end comes. I shall probably be unconscious, and not know whether you
are here or not, but I know you. You're the kind that if you give a
promise you won't break it, and I have a sort of feeling that I'd like
to go out holding your hand. Will you promise me that?"

Her eyes looked fiercely, compelling, into mine. I stepped forward and
laid my hand on hers, lying so weak on the bed.

"Of course I promise," I said pitifully.

There was a quick, savage gleam in her eyes which I could not fathom,
a gleam that vanished as quickly as it came. I told myself that the
look I had surprised in her eyes was one of ferocious triumph, and
that as my hand touched hers she had instinctively started to draw her
hand away from mine, and then yielded it to my grasp.

"All right," she said indifferently, closing her eyes. "Remember now,
don't go away."

"Dicky! Dicky! what have I done that you are so changed? How can
you be so cold to me when you remember all that we have been to each
other? Don't be so cruel to me. Kiss me just once, just once, as you
use