ut her ears held only the
memory of a man's footsteps--the eager tread that had never lingered so
much as a second's space on its way to her; that had often stumbled
slightly on the threshold of her presence; that she had heard and
welcomed in her dreams; that would not come again.

The raindrops lay like tears upon her face.

She brushed them aside, and, rising, put up her hands to feel the wet
lying heavy on her hair. The coldness of her limbs surprised her
faintly. Downstairs she went again, the echoes mocking every step.

She closed the door of the room behind her and idly cleared a scrap of
paper from a chair. Mechanically her hands went to the litter on his
desk and she had straightened it all before she realised that there was
no longer any need. To-morrow would bring a voice she did not know;
would usher a stranger into her room to take her measure from behind a
barrier of formality. For the rest there would be work, and food, and
sleep.

These things would make life--life that had been love.

She put on her hat and coat. The room seemed smaller somehow and
shabbier. The shaded lights that had invited, now merely irritated; the
whimsical disorder of books and papers spoke only of an uncompleted
task. Gone was the glamour and the promise and the good comradeship. He
had taken them all. She faced to-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow
empty-handed--in her heart the memory of words that had seared and
healed in a breath, and the dead dream of a kiss. Her throat ached with
the pain of it.

And then suddenly she heard him coming back!

She stiffened. For one instant, mind and body, she was rigid with the
sheer wonder of it. Then, as the atmosphere of the room surged back,
tense with vitality, her mind leapt forward in welcome. He was coming
back, coming back! The words hammered themselves out to the rhythm of
the eager tread that never lingered so much as a second's space on its
way to her, that stumbled slightly on the threshold of her presence.

By some queer, reflex twist of memory, her hands brushed imaginary
raindrops from her face and strayed uncertainly to where the wet had
lain on her hair.

The door opened and closed behind him.

"I've come back. I've come back to kiss you. Dear--_dear_!"

Her outflung hand checked him in his stride towards her. Words came
stammering to her lips.

"Why--but--this isn't--I don't understand! All you said--it was true,
surely? It was cruel of you to make me know