Probably no one else could feel what he felt and live--so Dickie in young love's eternal fashion believed in his own miracle; but she might have loved him a little, a very little, in time--if she hadn't seen him beaten and shamed and cuffed out of her presence like a dog. Now there was no hope. No hope at all. No hope. Dickie rocked his head against his arm. He had told Sheila that he would take care of her, but he could not even defend himself. He had told her that he would die to save her any suffering, but, before her, he had writhed and gasped helplessly under the weight of another man's hand, his open hand, not even a fist.... No after act of his could efface from Sheila's memory that picture of his ignominy. She had seen him twisted and bent and beaten and thrown away. His father had triumphantly returned to reassure and comfort her for the insult of a boy's impertinence. Would Sheila defend him? Would she understand? Or would she not be justified in contemptuous laughter at his pretensions? Such thoughts--less like thoughts, however, than like fiery fever fits--twisted and scorched Dickie's mind as he lay there. They burnt into him wounds that for years throbbed slowly into scars. At noon the heat of his room became even more intolerable than his thoughts. His head beat with pain. He was bathed in sweat, weak and trembling. He dragged himself up, went to his washstand, and dipped his wincing face into the warmish, stale water. His lips felt cracked and dry and swollen. In the wavy mirror he saw a distorted image of his face, with its heavy eyes, scattered hair, and the darkening marks of his father's blows, punctuated by the scarlet scratches of the emerald. He dried his face, loosened his collar, and, gasping for air, came out into the narrow hall. The hotel was very still. He hurried through it, his face bent, and went by the back way to the saloon. At this hour Sheila was asleep. Carthy would be alone in The Aura and there would be few, if any, customers. Dickie found the place cool and quiet and empty, shuttered from the sun, the air stirred by electric fans. Carthy dozed in his chair behind the bar. He gave Dickie his order, somnambulantly. Dickie took it off to a dim corner and drank with the thirst of a wounded beast.