"Well," Manuel said, stoutly, "I do not regret it, and for Niafer's sake I am willing to become a hundred and six. But certainly it is hard to think of myself as an old fellow on the brink of the scrap-pile." "Oho, you are not yet so old, Count Manuel, but that Suskind's power is greater than the power of the child: and besides, there is a way to break the power of the child. Death has merely scratched small wrinkles, very lightly, with one talon, to mark you as his by and by. That is all as yet: and so the power of my high sister Suskind endures over you, who were once used to follow after your own thinking and your own desire, for there remains in you a leaven even to-day. Yes, yes, though you deny her to-day, you will be entreating her to-morrow, and then it may be she will punish you. Either way, I must be going now, since you are obstinate, for it is at this time I run about the September world collecting my sister's revenues, and her debtors are very numerous." And with that the boy, still smiling gravely, slipped out of the third window into the gray sweet-smelling dusk, and little Melicent said, "But, Father, why did that queer sad boy want me to be climbing out of the window with him?" "So that he might be kind to you, my dear, as he estimates kindness." "But why did the sad boy want a piece of my hair?" asked Melicent; "and why did he cut it off with his big shiny shears, while you were writing, and he was playing with me?" "It was to pay a price," says Manuel. He knew now that the Alf charm was laid on his loved child, and that this was the price of his junketings. He knew also that Suskind would never remit this price. Then Melicent demanded, "And what makes your face so white?" "It must be pale with hunger, child: so I think that you and I had better be getting to our dinner." [Illustration] XXXVIII Farewell to Suskind But after dinner Dom Manuel came alone into the Room of Ageus, and equipped himself as the need was, and he climbed out of the charmed window for the last time. His final visit to the depths was horrible, they say, and they relate that of all the deeds of Dom Manuel's crowded lifetime the thing that he did on this day was the most grim. But he won through all, by virtue of his equipment and his fixed heart. So when Dom Manuel returned he clasped in his left hand a lock of fine straw-colored hair, and on both his hands was blood let from no human veins. He looked back for the last time into the gray depths. A crowned girl rose beside him noiselessly, all white and red, and she clasped her bloodied lovely arms about him, and she drew him to her hacked young breasts, and she kissed him for the last time. Then her arms were loosed from about Dom Manuel, and she fell away from him, and was swallowed by the gray sweet-scented depths.