endurance unknown to him, and soon I felt his grasp weaken. Little by
little I mastered him, until with the grip of a giant I crushed him in
my arms.

He looked up at me despairingly.

"You will not kill me, Roger?" he gasped.

"Would you not have killed me if you could?" I said, for there was
murder in my heart. "You have killed my Ruth, and now----"

I did not finish the sentence, for, in spite of myself, I felt him
dragging me nearer the edge of the cliff, nor was I able to stop him
until we were within a foot or so from the awful precipice. Then I
lifted him from the ground and held him. His strength seemed gone,
while mine was unabated.

What should I do with him? He was the destroyer of my life's
happiness, he had killed my love, he had filled me with despair; but he
was my brother. Should I destroy the venomous life that wrought only
evil? or----

"Hurl him over!" said the devil within me, "he is your blight, your
curse! Show him no mercy, let him be dashed to pieces, and thus you
will avenge your misery, and avenge Ruth's death!"

[Illustration: "'Hurl him over!' said the devil within me."]

"No, no, he's your brother, forgive him!" said another voice.

All this passed through my mind in the moment, that I felt him struggle
again, then, with an awful shriek, he fell from me.

I stood alone on that dizzy height--alone! I was the conqueror. I was
avenged. Ruth's murderer was dead.

I looked around me, and I remembered where I stood.

Long years before I had gone to the vicarage, and on this spot I had
seen a shadowy, shapeless figure in white!

On the night my father had died I was standing on this place when I saw
between the prongs of the "Devil's Tooth" the omen of darkness.

Now, standing there alone, I realised what had been done on this place
of evil memory.

I stood on the edge of the cliff and looked down I could see nothing,
but below me I heard the waves break upon the rocks, and they seemed to
laugh with fiendish glee, and mock me in my black despair.

CHAPTER XVIII

HELL!

I cried to God, "Oh, I am so weary."

God said, "You have not seen half hell."

I said, "I cannot see more, I am afraid. In my own narrow little path
I dare not walk, because I think that one has dug a pit for me; and if
I put my hand to take a fruit I draw it back again, because I think it
has been kissed. If I look out across the plains the mounds are
covered houses; and when I pass among