stopped short, panting. She could see the sweat dropping from his
forehead; his teeth began to chatter. She still held his arm tightly
with both hands.

"Let me go--" he said, catching his breath spasmodically.

"Not till you tell me where you've been--what you've been doing--tell
me."

"Doing--" He brought out the word with difficulty.

"Yes, doing, don't you hear?" She shook his arm violently in her anxious
terror.

"I don't know--" the words were a long groan.

"Where have you been then?--quick, tell me--"

He began to shake with a hard nervous chill.

"With him--over in the quarry woods--I tried to take him--he fought
me--" The chill shook him till he could scarcely stand.

She dropped his arm; drew away from him as if touching were
contamination; then her eyes, dilating with a still greater horror,
fixed themselves on the bosom of his shirt--there was a stain--

"Have you killed him--" she whispered hoarsely.

The answer came through the clattering teeth:

"I--I don't know--you said--you said you--never wanted to see him
again--"

Luigi found himself speaking the last words to the empty air; he was
alone, in the middle of the road, in the full glare of an electric
light. He was conscious of a desire to escape from it, to escape
detection--to rid himself of his over-powering misery in the quietest way
possible. He gathered himself together; his limbs steadied; the
shivering grew less; he went on down the road at a quick walk. Already
the quarrymen were coming out in force to see what might be up. He must
avoid them at all hazards.

* * * * *

One thought was the motive power which sent Aileen running up the road
towards the pastures, by crossing which she could reach in a few minutes
the quarry woods: "I must know if he is dead; if he is not dead, I must
try to save him from a living death."

This thought alone sent her speeding over the darkened slopes. She was
light of foot, but sometimes she stumbled; she was up and on again--the
sheepfold her goal. The quarry woods stood out dark against the clear
sky; there seemed to be more light on these uplands than below in The
Gore; she saw the sheepfold like a square blot on the pasture slope. She
reached it--should she call aloud--call his name? How find him?

She listened intently; the wind had died down; the sheep were huddling
and moving restlessly within the fold; this movement seemed unusual.
She climbed the rough