Dolores understood that the struggles of the spirit-dame and the wail that came from the depths were in resistance of his mental brutality. Yet she, too, was moved to action by a thought. Stepping close to the edge, she contested Satan’s clutch of the old shade; drew her back; bade her begone. “Lift your prayers upward, mother,” she breathed in a voice of the night-winds. “I have heard that only God Himself can save.” Her shoulders were seized in a fiendish clutch. “Enough of that only-God drivel! You trying to checkmate _me_?” As she was twisted around to meet the Mind-Master’s glare, she shook at the clash of his will against her own; knew herself conquered; realized that, without being dragged, she was returning to the rim of the Wantons’ Well. She was going over ... over.... “Might as well end it now as later on,” Satan snarled. “How are you going to like it down there, Dolores Trent--down where your world has sent you--down where there is no difference?” All was over then, thought the spirit-girl. And her baby---- * * * * * She had heard his laughter quite a while before she began to understand. Opening her eyes, she saw that she still stood on hella-firma. In time she must have been willed back from the brink. Nearby sat His Majesty, shaken by unholy mirth. To Dolores this ebullition was more terrifying than his recent wrath. After the emotional stress of the morning, she felt that she could not endure it. Glancing in the direction taken by the crone-shade, she made out the bent figure dissolving into the brume. She arose and faced her tormentor. “I wish you wouldn’t laugh that way,” she said, calmly as she could. Satan wiped his eyes. “I do get so amused at the rages into which I work myself to frighten folks,” he commented when able to articulate. “Really, you can’t imagine how much fun I have with myself. Pardon me, but I--I just can’t get over your----” “Won’t Your Highness oblige me by----” “My Lowness.” “Your Lowness. Please, Pluto.” “‘Please, Pluto!’” Although mocking her, he settled into seriousness. “When you get tricky like that--call me friendly names for favors, you know--it is then that I have hopes of you. Didn’t you know I was only fooling? Do you suppose I’d drop you over the rim before hearing the rest of those griefs to men?” * * * * * They returned to the Hell Hawk by way of The Lane of Futile Labors. Although the King seemed minded to hurry, Dolores’ steps lagged, so absorbing were the illusory sights on either hand. In a fenced plot a gardener was on his knees before a line of young rose-plants. A stray weed he pulled with eager hand. The soil around the roots, pulverized already from his diligence, he loosened yet again. Anxiously he lifted his eyes toward the electric sun, the while fanning with his trowel the drooping leaves.