d
you get away?"

Again his keen eyes searched hers.

"As for getting away," he said, slowly, "when a Prophet has a Precursor,
he should be able to arrange these things. Five o'clock is a dull hour
at Hellier Crescent. The Arch-Mystics are perusing the Scitsym; the
Precursor is guarding the sacred threshold of the Prophet; the Prophet
is--presumably--communing with his Soul. The routine of this evening
differs in no way from the routine of any other evening--except that the
Precursor is rather more than usually vigilant in his watch." Again the
forced flippancy was apparent; and to Enid, staring at him with wide,
perplexed eyes, there was something inexplicable and alarming in this
new and unfamiliar attitude. With a tremor of foreboding, her glance
travelled over his face.

"Has anything happened?" she asked. "Have the People done wrong? Have
you--have you been called elsewhere?" At the last dread possibility her
voice faltered.

But the Prophet stood cold and almost rigid. At last, by an immense
effort, he seemed to gather himself together for some tremendous end.

"Enid," he said, gravely, "I don't know how much you know of life, but I
presume you know very little. I presume that--and shall act on the
presumption. I shall not expect--even ask--any leniency of you.

"I came here this evening to tell you something that will alter your
opinion of me so effectually that nothing hereafter can reinstate me in
your mind." He spoke slowly and deliberately, without tremor or falter.
Whatever of struggle lay behind his words, it lay with the past. It was
evident as he stood there in the pretty, luxurious room, that he
possessed a purpose, and that he held to it without thought of a
retrograde step.

"I have come to make a confession," he said, quietly. "Not because I
believe in the habit of unburdening one's conscience, but because there
is something you have a right to know--"

"I--? A right to know?" Her lips paled.

"Yes. A right to know." With a sudden access of feeling he dropped her
hands and turned towards the window, where the last glimmer of the
wintry twilight showed through the soft silk curtains.

"I am putting myself in your hands," he said, steadily. "I am
jeopardizing myself utterly by what I am going to say; but it seems to
me the only way by which I can make--well, can patch up some poor
amends--

"I may be presumptuous, but I believe--I think--that I have stood for
something in your eyes." He t