sort of excuse for my weakness--for I
was blazing hot after the last dance--and the gaiety and uproar and
laughter all overexcited me--and then what I had seen you do, and
your not coming to me, and that ominous uneasy impulse stirring!

"That is the truth as I analyse it. The dreadful thing is that I
could have been capable of dealing our chance of happiness such a
cowardly blow.

"Well, it is over. The thing has fled for a while. I fought it down,
stamped on it with utter horror and loathing. It--the
encounter--tired me. I am weary yet--from honourable wounds. But I
won out. If it comes back again--Oh, Duane! and it surely will--I
shall face it undaunted once more; and every hydra-head that stirs I
shall kill until the thing lies dead between us for all time.

"Then, dear, will you take the girl who has done this thing?

"GERALDINE SEAGRAVE."

This was his answer on the eve of his departure.

And on the morning of it Geraldine came down to say good-bye; a fresh,
sweet, and bewildering Geraldine, somewhat slimmer than when he had last
seen her, a little finer in feature, more delicate of body; and there
was about her even a hint of the spirituel as a fascinating trace of
what she had been through, locked in alone behind the doors of her room
and heart.

She bade him good-morning somewhat shyly, offering her slim hand and
looking at him with the slight uncertainty and bent brows of a person
coming suddenly into a strong light.

He said under his breath: "You poor darling, how thin you are."

"Athletics," she said; "Jacob wrestled with an angel, but you know what
I've been facing in the squared circle. Don't speak of it any more, will
you? ... How sunburned you are! What have you been about since I've kept
to my room?"

"I've painted Miller's kids in the open; I suppose the terrific
influence of Sorolla has me in bondage for the moment." He laughed
easily: "But don't worry; it will leave nothing except clean inspiration
behind it. I'll think out my own way--grope it out through Pantheon and
living maze. All I've really got to say in paint can be said only in my
own way. I know that, even when realising that I've been sunstruck by
Sorolla."

She listened demurely, watching him, her lips sensitive with
understanding; and she laughed when he laughed away his fealty to the
superb Spaniard, knowing himself and th