“There is a question between us,” her lips murmured reminder. “You can compel me, but you want my consent. You spoke just now of a sporting proposition. Very well, I’ll make you a bet. This favor I ask you against----” She could not control the shiver that seized her. The spit of fork-tongued lightnings excused the droop of her face. For a moment the growl of thunder silenced her voice. “I can keep promises, too. This favor against--anything--you want--of me.” She had pledged--herself. Her two hands slipped within his and clung, palm to palm. They and her voice shook with loathing which she prayed he might mistake for the tremors of love. “Dear, _dear_ Devil,” she begged him. His answer was in terms of action. He returned to the dais and seated himself in the throne-chair. He bade the guard unhand their prisoner and sent the dwarfs to summon those whose release had been stipulated by the famed siren as her price. From a jewel-box he selected a fillet of pearls supporting a single, magnificent drop of light, red as a tear of blood. This he placed upon Dolores’ night-black hair. It was, he made formal announcement, her betrothal crown. Only John Cabot failed to salaam before the queen-elect. Straight to her he strode; bent that only she might hear his suppressed appeal. “Do you expect me to believe in your inconstancy?” he asked. “What force has crushed your courage, that you hesitate to trust your fate to me? Because I seemed to fail you on Earth, do you fear that I shall do so in this inter-world? Is there no voice in your heart to tell you how gladly I should have forfeited my passport to the Fields to spare you this profanation? They say that Shadow Land is only the waiting place. Wait with me, Dolores. Don’t cast yourself too low for later recall.” The persistence of his faith both shamed and blessed the spirit-girl. Evidently he was struggling against the influence of mal-appearances. How could she have doubted such absolving love? For herself, surely her Hell was the there and the now. She must remember that his safety and that of the hapless atom born of their passion hung in the balance. Yet even him and their babe she must have sacrificed, if necessary, for the greater issue. The fate of the Universe, which the Maker seemed to have forgot, depended upon the pseudo-treachery of her looks and speech.