gan to stride to and fro; his pale, sunken face deeply
shadowed, his hands clenching and unclenching.

"What in God's name," he said fiercely, "are women like you doing to
us! What do you suppose happens to such a man as I when the girl he
loves tells him she cares only to be his mistress! What hope is there
left in him?--what sense, what understanding, what faith?

"You don't have to tell me that the Crimson Tide is rising. I saw it
in the Argonne. I wish to God I were back there and the hun was still
resisting. I wish I had never lived to come back here and see what
demoralisation is threatening my own country from that cursed germ of
wilful degeneracy born in the Prussian twilight, fed in Russian
desolation, infecting the whole world----"

His voice died in his throat; he walked swiftly past her, turned at
the threshold:

"I've known three of you," he said, "--you and Ilse and Marya. I've
seen a lot of your associates and acquaintances who profess your
views. And I've seen enough."

He hesitated; then when he could control his voice again:

"It's bad enough when a woman refuses marriage to a man she does not
love. That man is going to be unhappy. But have you any idea what
happens to him when the girl he loves, and who says she cares for him,
refuses marriage?

"It was terrible even when you cared for me only a little. But--but
now--do you know what I think of your creed? I hate it as you hated
the beasts who slew your friend! Damn your creed! To hell with it!"

She covered her face with both hands: there was a noise like thunder
in her brain.

She heard the door close sharply in the hall below.

This was the end.

CHAPTER XXII

She felt a trifle weak. In her ears there lingered a dull, confused
sensation, like the echo of things still falling. Something had gone
very wrong with the scheme of nature. Even beneath her feet, now, the
floor seemed unsteady, unreliable.

A half-darkness dimmed her eyes; she laid one slim hand on the sofa-back
and seated herself, fighting instinctively for consciousness.

She sat there for a long while. The swimming faintness passed away. An
intense stillness seemed to invade her, and the room, and the street
outside. And for vast distances beyond. Half hours and hours rang
clearly through the silence from the mantel-clock. So still was the
place that a sheaf of petals falling from a fading rose on the piano
seemed to fill the room with ghostly rustling.