madness is it that
brings me to loving her and longing for her and yet makes of me a thing so
much less worthy than she?" And so on by the hour, day and night, he
cursed himself with questions.

* * * * *

The end came swiftly, resistlessly. She paused at the bottom of the steps
as the automobile slid off into the chill, windy night. For the first time
in all his vigil, he noted the absence of the footman who always ran up
the steps ahead of her to open the door. She was alone to-night. This had
never happened before. Mystified, he saw her slowly ascend the steps and
pause before the door. Her body drooped wearily. He waited long for her to
press the electric button which had taken the place of the ancient knob
that jangled the bell at the far end of the hall. But she remained
motionless for what seemed to him an interminable time, and then, to his
consternation, she leaned against the door and covered her face with her
hands.

A great weight suddenly was lifted from his soul; a vast exaltation drove
out everything that had been oppressing him for so long. He was free! He
was free of the thing that had been driving him to death. Joy, so
overwhelming in its rush that he almost collapsed as it assailed him,
swept aside every vestige of resistance,--and, paradox of paradoxes,--made a
man of him! He was a man and he would--But even as his jaw set and his body
straightened in its old, dominant strength, she opened the door and passed
into the dim hall beyond.

He was half across the street when the door closed behind her, but he did
not pause. His hand came from his pocket and in his rigid fingers he held
the key to his home--and hers.

At the bottom of the steps he halted. The lights in the drawing-room had
been switched on. The purpose that filled him now was so great that he
waited long there, grasping the hand rail, striving to temper his new-
found strength to the gentleness that was in his heart. The fight was
over, and he had won--the man of him had won. She was in that room where
the lights were,--waiting for him. The moment was not far off when she
would be in his arms. He was suffocating with the thought of the nearness
of it all!

He mounted the steps. As he came to the top, the door was opened and Anne
stood there in the warm light of the hall,--a slender, swaying figure in
something rose-coloured and--and her lips were parted in a wondering,
enchanted smile. She held out he