"I will take away from thee the desire of thine eyes with a stroke; yet neither shall thou mourn nor weep; neither shall thy tears fall down." The clock on the mantelpiece struck nine. A silence, painful and intense, so profound that Beryl's quick breathings were audible. "I will take away the desires of thine eyes with a stroke--" "Don't read it again!" cried Steppe harshly. "I'm going--listening to this fool--come on, Beryl." Turning at the door she saw him still standing at the table. His face was in shadow, his hands white and shapely, outspread upon the leather-covered top; the open book between them. "He's drunk," said Steppe and she made no reply. Jan Steppe was very preoccupied all that evening, but not so completely oblivious of realities that he did not bargain with the doctor for certain shares in the Klein River Mine. Just before he had left his house Steppe had received a code cable from Johannesburg. III On the morning of Ambrose Sault's execution, Evie found a letter awaiting her at the drug store. Whatever natural unhappiness of feeling she may have had when she left her weeping mother, vanished in the perusal of Ronnie's long epistle. The envelope bore the St. John's Wood postmark, but this she would not have regarded as significant, even if she had noticed it, which she did not. Not a love letter in the strictest sense; it was too precise and businesslike for that. It gave her certain dates to be cherished, certain instructions to be observed. It went to the length of naming Parisian dressmakers where she might be expeditiously fitted. She was to bring nothing, only a suitcase with bare necessities. A week's stay in Paris would give her all the time she needed to equip herself. It was a trial to her that she would not see Ronnie for a month, not until the great day--she caught her breath at the thought. But he had stipulated this. Ronnie was too keen a student of women to give her the opportunity of changing her mind. His letters could not be argued with, or questioned. And the month would quickly pass. Teddy Williams was a faithful attendant and, although he could not be compared in any respect with Ronnie, it was pleasant and flattering to extend her patronage to one who hung upon her words and regarded her as an authority upon most subjects. She had imparted her views on marriage to Teddy, and that young man had been impressed without being convinced. Ronnie's letter was to be read and re-read. She expected another the next day and, when it did not come, she was disappointed. Yet he had not promised to write; in his letter he had said: "Until you are my very own, I shall live the life of an anchorite."