a foreshadowing of the pain of separation.

"My beloved!" He held her a little away from him so that he might look
into her face. Then with a swift, passionate eagerness; "Say that you
love me, Nan?"

"Why, Peter--Peter, you know it," she cried tremulously. "It doesn't
need telling, dear. . . . Only--it's forbidden."

"Yes," he assented gravely. "It's forbidden us. But now--just this
once--let us have a few moments, you and I alone, when there's no need
to pretend we don't care--when we can be _ourselves_!"

"No--no--" she broke in breathlessly.

"It's not much, to ask--five minutes together out of the whole of life!
Roger can't grudge them. He'll have you--always." His arms closed
jealously round her.

"Yes--always," she repeated. With a sudden choked cry she clung to him
despairingly.

"Peter, sometimes I feel I can't bear it! Oh, why were we _allowed_ to
care like this?"

"God knows!" he muttered.

He released his hold of her abruptly and began pacing up and
down--savagely, like some caged beast. Nan stood staring out over the
moon-washed sea with eyes that saw nothing. The five minutes they had
snatched together from the rest of life were slipping by--each one a
moment of bitter and intolerable anguish.

Presently Peter swung round and came to her side. But he did not touch
her. His face looked drawn, and his eyes burned smoulderingly--like
fire half-quenched.

"Nan, if I didn't care so much, I'd ask you to go away with me.
I--don't quite know what life will be like without you--hell, probably.
But at least it's going to be my own little hell and I'm not going to
drag you down into it. I'm bound irrevocably. And you--you're bound,
too. You can't play fast and loose with the promise you've given
Trenby. So we've just got to face it out." He broke off abruptly.
Tiny beads of sweat rimmed his upper lip and his hands hung clenched at
his sides. Even Nan hardly realised the effort his restraint was
costing him.

"What--what do you mean, Peter?" she asked haltingly.

"I mean that I'm going away--that I mustn't see you any more."

A cry fled from her lips--denying, supplicating, and at the desolate
sound of it a tremor ran through his limbs. It was as though his body
fought and struggled against the compelling spirit within it.

"We mustn't meet again," he went on steadily.

"Not meet--ever--do you mean?" There was something piteous in the
young, shaken voice.

"Never, if we ca