peed until strength
failed and gasoline gave out.

Was that the lake which stirred in the windless night? The lake, under
which lay the fire-blackened ruins of the house where the first Desire
Michell flung open an awful door that her vengeance might stride
through!

Was it too late for my Desire to come, and time for the coming of that
Other?

The step of Vere sounded on the gravel path where he walked beneath the
window. He was making a trip of inspection, and would find no light
shining from the room. I was about to rise and call down a word of
reassurance to him, when a current of spiced air passed by me. I sat
arrested in hope and expectancy.

"Here, after my warning, after last night?" her soft voice panted across
the dark. "Will you die, then? Cruel to me, and wicked to come here
again! Oh, must I wish you were a coward!"

Every vestige of her calmness gone, she was sobbing as she spoke. I
could imagine she was wringing the little hands that once had left a
betraying print upon my table's surface.

"I was cruel to you last night, Desire; yet afterward you saved my life
by sending Ethan Vere to wake me. Would you have had me leave without
meeting you again, neither thanking you nor asking your forgiveness?"

I thought she came nearer.

"For so little, you would brave the Dread One in Its time of triumph? O
steadfast soldier, who faces the Breach even in the hour of death, in
all that you have done you have remembered me. Why speak of anger or
forgiveness? Have I not injured you?"

"Never. I love you."

"Is not that an injury? Even though I hid my ill-omened face from you,
reared as I was to sad knowledge of the wrath upon me, the wrong has
been done. Weak as water in the test, I kept the letter of my promise
and broke the intent. Yet go; keep life at least."

"Desire, I do not understand you," I answered. "No matter for that, now!
I am content to share whatever you bring. Not roughly or in challenge as
I asked you last night, but earnestly and with humility I ask you to
come away with me now. If trouble comes to my wife and me, I do not
doubt we can bear it. Let us not be frightened from the attempt. Come."

"I, to take happiness like that?" she marveled in desolate amazement.
"No. At least I will go to my own place, if tardily. Roger, be kind to
me. Give me a last gift. Let me know that somewhere you are living. Out
of my sight, out of my knowledge, but living in the same world with me.
Each momen