ommon things; I didn't
pretend for a moment that he and she were common people. Pray, if they
_had_ been, how should I ever have cared for them? They had enjoyed a
rare extension of being and they had caught me up in their flight; only
I couldn't breathe in such an air and I promptly asked to be set
down. Everything in the facts was monstrous, and most of all my lucid
perception of them; the only thing allied to nature and truth was my
having to act on that perception. I felt after I had spoken in this
sense that my assurance was complete; nothing had been wanting to it but
the sight of my effect on him. He disguised indeed the effect in a cloud
of chaff, a diversion that gained him time and covered his retreat.
He challenged my sincerity, my sanity, almost my humanity, and that of
course widened our breach and confirmed our rupture. He did everything
in short but convince me either that I was wrong or that he was unhappy;
we separated, and I left him to his inconceivable communion.

He never married, any more than I've done. When six years later, in
solitude and silence, I heard of his death I hailed it as a direct
contribution to my theory. It was sudden, it was never properly
accounted for, it was surrounded by circumstances in which--for oh, I
took them to pieces!--I distinctly read an intention, the mark of
his own hidden hand. It was the result of a long necessity, of an
unquenchable desire. To say exactly what I mean, it was a response to an
irresistible call.

THE END

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