ery of separating the spirit from the
flesh, the soul from the body, the incorruptible from the corruptible.

It could not be! There was not a sign; there was not a sound; and what
should he be doing to be alone here, blind watcher of such a finality?
It was not real. It was an hallucination. He was not really here. The
morning--and days and weeks and years--would come, and he would know
that this never had really happened.

But Young Perch was dead. Young Perch was killed. It was real. He was
here. This war!

II

He had gone downstairs with the doctor and had remained there some
little time after his departure. Effie had been left kneeling by the
bed. When he came back she was sound asleep where she knelt, worn out.
The news had come on the previous evening. This was Effie's second night
without sleep. Now she was overcome; collapsed; suffocated and bound and
gagged in the opiates and bonds she had for thirty hours resisted. He
touched her. She did not stir. He shook her gently; still no response.
He lifted her up and carried her along the passage to the room he knew
to be hers; laid her on her bed and covered her with a quilt.
Inconceivable occupation. Was all this really happening?

Two o'clock. He went to look at Effie, still in profound slumber. Why
awaken her? Nothing could be done; only watch. He returned to his vigil.

Yes, Mrs. Perch was sinking. More pronounced now that masklike aspect of
her face. Yes, dying. He spoke the word to himself. "Dying." As of a
fire in the grate gone to one dull spark among the greying ashes.--It is
out; it cannot burn again. So life here too far retired, too deeply sunk
to struggle back and vitalise again that hue, those lips, that masklike
effigy.

Profound and awful mystery. Within that form was in process a most
dreadful activity. The spirit was preparing to vacate the habitation it
had so long occupied. It gave no sign. The better to hide its
preparations it had drawn that mask about the face. Seventy years it had
sojourned here; now it was bound away. Seventy years it had been known
to passers-by through the door and windows of this its habitation; now,
deeply retired within the inner chambers, it set its house in order to
be gone. Profound and awful mystery. Dreadful and momentous activity.
From the windows of her eyes turning off the lights; from the engines of
her powers cutting off its forces; drawing the furnaces; dissevering the
contacts. A lifetime within thi