head-downward on to a tree trunk and then ran away--of course only for a
moment.

For this she scolded him well. But she had a thrill of joy when she
thought of the weak boy in the clutches of the strong one.

V

Gerald died that afternoon. He was broken up in the football match.
Rickie and Mr. Pembroke were on the ground when the accident took place.
It was no good torturing him by a drive to the hospital, and he was
merely carried to the little pavilion and laid upon the floor. A doctor
came, and so did a clergyman, but it seemed better to leave him for the
last few minutes with Agnes, who had ridden down on her bicycle.

It was a strange lamentable interview. The girl was so accustomed to
health, that for a time she could not understand. It must be a joke that
he chose to lie there in the dust, with a rug over him and his knees
bent up towards his chin. His arms were as she knew them, and their
admirable muscles showed clear and clean beneath the jersey. The face,
too, though a little flushed, was uninjured: it must be some curious
joke.

"Gerald, what have you been doing?"

He replied, "I can't see you. It's too dark."

"Oh, I'll soon alter that," she said in her old brisk way. She opened
the pavilion door. The people who were standing by it moved aside. She
saw a deserted meadow, steaming and grey, and beyond it slateroofed
cottages, row beside row, climbing a shapeless hill. Towards London the
sky was yellow. "There. That's better." She sat down by him again, and
drew his hand into her own. "Now we are all right, aren't we?"

"Where are you?"

This time she could not reply.

"What is it? Where am I going?"

"Wasn't the rector here?" said she after a silence.

"He explained heaven, and thinks that I--but--I couldn't tell a parson;
but I don't seem to have any use for any of the things there."

"We are Christians," said Agnes shyly. "Dear love, we don't talk about
these things, but we believe them. I think that you will get well and
be as strong again as ever; but, in any case, there is a spiritual life,
and we know that some day you and I--"

"I shan't do as a spirit," he interrupted, sighing pitifully. "I want
you as I am, and it cannot be managed. The rector had to say so. I
want--I don't want to talk. I can't see you. Shut that door."

She obeyed, and crept into his arms. Only this time her grasp was the
stronger. Her heart beat louder and louder as the sound of his grew more
faint. He w