actually to feel in her arms its soft little body pressed against her.
Claude Ditmar's child! And she suddenly recalled, as an incident of the
remote past, that she had told him she wanted it!

This tense craving for it she felt now was somehow the answer to an
expressed wish which had astonished her. Perhaps that was the reason why
she had failed to do what she had tried to do, to shoot Ditmar and
herself! It was Ditmar's child, Ditmar's and hers! He had loved her, long
ago, and just now--was it just now?--he had said he loved her still, he
had wanted to marry her. Then why had she run away from him? Why had she
taken the child into outer darkness, to be born without a father,--when
she loved Ditmar? Wasn't that one reason why she wanted the child? why,
even in her moments of passionate hatred she recalled having been
surprised by some such yearning as now came over her? And for an
interval, a brief interval, she viewed him with startling clarity. Not
because he embodied any ideal did she love him, but because he was what
he was, because he had overcome her will, dominated and possessed her,
left his mark upon her indelibly. He had been cruel to her, willing to
sacrifice her to his way of life, to his own desires, but he loved her,
for she had seen, if not heeded in his eyes the look that a woman never
mistakes! She remembered it now, and the light in his window glowed
again, like a star to guide her back to him. It was drawing her,
irresistibly....

The sentry recognized her as she came along the canal.

"Mr. Ditmar's gone," he told her.

"Gone!" she repeated. "Gone!"

"Why, yes, about five minutes after you left he was looking for you--he
asked the sergeant about you."

"And--he won't be back?"

"I guess not," answered the man, sympathetically. "He said good-night."

She turned away dully. The strength and hope with which she had been so
unexpectedly infused while gazing from the bridge at his window had
suddenly ebbed; her legs ached, her feet were wet, and she shivered,
though her forehead burned. The world became distorted, people flitted
past her like weird figures of a dream, the myriad lights of Faber Street
were blurred and whirled in company with the electric signs. Seeking to
escape from their confusion she entered a side street leading north, only
to be forcibly seized by some one who darted after her from the sidewalk.

"Excuse me, but you didn't see that automobile," he said, as he released
her