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He moved heavily as one driven by Fate, pulling the stable door to after him. This he turned to lock, then stooped, still with that face as of a death-mask, and deliberately extinguished his lantern.

Doris’s heart jerked again at the action, and every pulse began to clamour. Why did he put out the lantern before reaching the house?

The next moment she heard his footsteps, slow and heavy, coming towards her. The path wound along a bank a couple of feet above the mill-stream. He approached till in the darkness he had nearly reached her, then he stopped.

She thought he had discerned her, but the next moment she realized that he had not. He was facing the water; he seemed to be staring across it. And even as she watched he took another step straight towards it.

It was then that like a flashlight leaping from his brain to hers she realized what he was about to do. How the knowledge came to her she knew not, but it was hers past all disputing in that single second of blinding revelation. And just as that morning she had been inspired to act on sheer wild impulse, so now without an instant’s pause she acted again. She sprang from her hiding-place with a strangled cry, and threw her arms about him.

“Jeff! Jeff! What are you doing here?”

He gave a great start that made her think of a frightened animal, and stood still. She felt his arms grow rigid at his sides, and knew that his hands were clenched.

“Jeff!” she cried again, clinging faster. “You–you’re never thinking of–of that?”

Her utterance ended in a shudder as she sought with all her strength to drag him away from the icy water.

He resisted her doggedly, standing like a rock. “Whatever I’m thinking of doing is my affair,” he said, shortly and sternly. “Go away and leave me alone!”

“I won’t!” she cried back to him half-hysterically. “I won’t! If–if you’re going to do that, you’ll take me with you!”

He turned round then and moved back to the path. “Who said I was going to do anything?” he demanded in a voice that sounded half-angry and half-ashamed.

She answered him with absolute candour. “I saw your face just now. I couldn’t help knowing. Oh, Jeff, Jeff! is it as bad as that? Do you hate me so badly as that?”

He made a movement of the arms that was curiously passionate, but he did not attempt to take her into them. “I don’t hate you,” he said, in a voice that sounded half-choked. “I love you–so horribly”–there was a note of ferocity in the low-spoken words–“that I can never know any peace without you! And since with you it is otherwise, what remedy is there? You love Hugh Chesyl. You only want to be free to marry him. While I–“

He broke off in fierce impotence, and began to thrust her from him. But she held him fast.

“Jeff–Jeff, this is madness! Listen to me! You must listen! Hugh and I are friends, and we shall never be anything more. Jeff, let me be with you! Teach me to love you! You can if you will. Don’t–don’t ruin both our lives!”

She was pleading with him passionately, still holding him back. And, as she pleaded, she reached up her arms and slowly clasped his neck.

“Oh, Jeff, be good to me–be good to me just this once!” she prayed. “I’ve made such a hideous mistake, but don’t punish me like this! I swear if you go, I shall go too! There’ll be nothing left to live for. Jeff–Jeff, if you really love me, spare me this!”

The broken entreaty went into agonized sobbing, yet she kept her face upraised to his. Instinctively she knew that in that eleventh hour she must offer all she had.

Several moments throbbed away. She began to think that she had failed. And then very suddenly he moved, put his arm about her, led her away.