bedience, well knowing that,
though in all else they were poles asunder, in this thing they were
as one. They were allied in the one great effort to defeat the
Destroyer. They fought day and night, shoulder to shoulder, never
yielding, never despairing, never slacking.

And very gradually at last the tide that had ebbed so low began to
turn. Through bitter suffering, often against his will, Guy Ranger
was drawn slowly back again to the world he had so nearly left.
Kieff never let him suffer for long. He gave him oblivion whenever
the weakened endurance threatened to fail. And Sylvia, seeing that
the flickering strength was always greater under the influence of
Kieff's remedy, raised no protest. They fought death with the
weapon of death. It would be time enough when the battle was won
to cast that weapon aside.

During those days of watching and conflict, she held little
converse with Guy. He was like a child, content in his waking
hours to have her near him, and fretful if she were ever absent.
Under Kieff's guidance, she nursed him with unfailing care,
developing a skill with which she had never credited herself. As
gradually his strength returned, he would have her do everything
for him, resenting even Kieff's interference though never actively
resisting his authority. He seemed to stand in awe of Kieff,
Sylvia noticed, a feeling from which she herself was not wholly
free. For there was a subtle mastery about him which influenced
her in spite of herself. But she had put aside her instinctive
dislike of the man because of the debt she owed him. He had
brought Guy back, had wrenched him from the very jaws of Death, and
she would never forget it. He had saved her from a life-long
sorrow.

And so, as slowly Guy returned, she schooled herself to subdue a
certain distrust of him which was never wholly absent from her
consciousness. She forced herself to treat him as a friend. She
silenced the warning voice within her that had bade her so
constantly beware. Perhaps her own physical endurance had begun to
waver a little after the long strain. Undoubtedly his influence
over her was such as it could scarcely have become under any other
circumstances. Her long obedience to his will in the matter of Guy
had brought her to a state of submission at which once she would
have scoffed. And when at last, the worst of the battle over, she
was overtaken by an overpowering weariness of mind and body, all
thing