hat he could give her--of his
youth, his strength, his vigorous hold upon life. Through all the
tangle of his expanding interests in existence, the medley of
strange happenings in which he found himself involved, one thing
alone was clear. He was passing on into a life making larger demands
upon, him, a life in which their companionship must naturally
become a slighter thing. Nevertheless, he spoke to her reassuringly.

"You cannot believe, Ruth," he said, "that I shall ever forget? We
have been through too much together, too many dark days."

She sighed.

"There wasn't much for either of us to look forward to, was there,
when we first looked down on the river together and you began to
tell me fairy stories."

"They kept our courage alive," he declared. "I am not sure that they
are not coming true."

She half closed her eyes.

"For you, Arnold," she murmured. "Not all the fancies that were ever
spun in the brain of any living person could alter life very much
for me."

He took her hand and held it tightly. Yet it was hard to know what
to say to her. It was the inevitable tragedy, this, of their sexes
and her infirmity. He realized in those few minutes something of how
she was feeling,--the one who is left upon the lonely island while
the other is borne homeward into the sunshine and tumult of life.
There was little, indeed, which he could say. It was not the hour,
this, for protestation.

They passed along Piccadilly, across Leicester Square, and into the
Strand. The wayfarers in the streets, of whom there were still
plenty, seemed to be lingering about in sheer joy of the cooler
night after the unexpected heat of the day, the women in light
clothes, the men with their coats thrown open and carrying their
hats. They passed down the Strand and into Adam Street, coming at
last to a standstill before the tall, gloomy house at the corner of
the Terrace. Arnold stepped out onto the pavement and helped his
companion to alight. The chauffeur lifted his hat and the car
glided away. As they stood there, for a moment, upon the pavement,
and Arnold pushed open the heavy, shabby door, it seemed, indeed, as
though the whole day might have been a dream.

Ruth moved wearily along the broken, tesselated pavement, and paused
for a moment before the first flight of stairs. Arnold, taking her
stick from her, caught her up in his arms. Her fingers closed around
his neck and she gave a little sigh of relief.

"Will you really