g strange tricks with me. Life, which a few months
ago had been a cold and barren thing, was suddenly pressed to my lips, a
fantastic, intoxicating mixture. I had drawn enough poison into my
veins. I would have no more. I swore it.

* * * * *

I tried to leave the castle unnoticed, but the place was alive with
servants. One of them hurried up to me as I tried to reach my hat and
coat.

"Her ladyship desired me to say that she was in the billiard-room, sir,"
he announced.

"Will you tell Lady Angela--" and then I stopped. The door of the
billiard-room was open, and Lady Angela stood there, the outline of her
figure sharply de fined against a flood of light. She had a cue in her
hand, and she looked across at me.

"You are a long time, Mr. Ducaine. I am waiting for you to give me a
lesson at billiards."

I crossed the hall to her side.

"I thought that as Lord Blenavon had gone out--"

She shrugged her shoulders.

"That you would evade your duty, which is clearly to stay and entertain
your hostess."

She closed the door and glanced at me curiously.

"What has happened to you?" she asked. "You look as though you had been
with ghosts."

"Is it so impossible?" I asked, moving a little nearer to the huge log
fire. "What company is more terrifying than the company of our dead
thoughts and dead hopes and dead memories?"

"Really, I am afraid that Blenavon must have been a very depressing
companion!" she said, leaning her elbow upon the broad mantelpiece.

It was absurd! I tried to shake myself free from the miseries of the
last hour.

"I am afraid it must have been the other way," I said, "for your brother
has gone out."

"Yes," she said quietly, "he has gone to that woman at Braster Grange.
I wish I knew what brought her into this part of the country."

I looked round at the billiard-table.

"Did you mean that you would like a game?" I asked. "I am rather out of
practice, but I used to fancy myself a little."

"I have no doubt," she answered, sinking into a low chair, "that you are
an excellent player, but I am willing to take it for granted. I do not
wish to play billiards. Draw that chair up to the fire and talk to me."

It was of all things what I wished to avoid that night. But there was
no escape. I obeyed her.

"What your brother has told me is, I presume, no secret," I said. "I am
to wish you happiness, am I not?"

She looked up at me in quick surprise.

"Di