ed.

"I've got to clear out. That's what I mean. Right away out. Back to
England."

I didn't speak.

"That's it," he went on, but now as though he were talking to himself.
"That's what you've got to do, old son.... She says so, and she's right.
Can't alter our love, you know. Nothing changes that. We've got to hold
on... Ought to have cleared out before...."

Suddenly he turned. He almost flung himself upon me. He gripped my arms
so that I would have cried out if the agony in his eyes hadn't held me.

"Here," he muttered, "let me alone for a moment. I must hold on. I'm
pretty well beat. I'm just about done."

For what seemed hours we sat there. I believe it was, in reality, only a
few minutes. He sat facing me, his eyes staring at me but not seeing me,
his body close against me, and I could see the sweat glistening on his
chest through the open pyjamas. He was rigid as though he had been
struck into stone.

He suddenly relaxed.

"That's right," he said; "thanks, old man. I'm better now. It's a bit
late, I expect, but stay on a while."

He got into bed. I sat beside him, gripped his hand, and ten minutes
later he was asleep.

XI

The next day, Tuesday, was stormy with wind and rain. It was strange to
see from my window the whirlpool of ice-encumbered waters. The rain fell
in slanting, hissing sheets upon the ice, and the ice, in lumps and
sheets and blocks, tossed and heaved and spun. At times it was as though
all the ice was driven by some strong movement in one direction, then it
was like the whole pavement of the world slipping down the side of the
firmament into space. Suddenly it would be checked and, with a kind of
quiver, station itself and hang chattering and clutching until the sweep
would begin in the opposite direction!

I could see only dimly through the mist, but it was not difficult to
imagine that, in very truth, the days of the flood had returned. Nothing
could be seen but the tossing, heaving welter of waters with the ice,
grim and grey through the shadows, like "ships and monsters,
sea-serpents and mermaids," to quote Galleon's _Spanish Nights_.

Of course the water came in through my own roof, and it was on that very
afternoon that I decided, once and for all, to leave this abode of mine.
Romantic it might be; I felt it was time for a little comfortable
realism. My old woman brought me the usual cutlets, macaroni, and tea
for lunch; then I wrote to a friend in England; and finally,