ever reproach him, telling him that he had spoilt her life, and would not he be for ever watching to catch that moment when she would realize how dull, how old, how negative he was? No, he could not . . . he could not . . . Then there swept over him all the fire of the other impulse. Why should he not, at long last, be happy? Could any man in the world be better to her than he would be? After all he was not so old. Had he not known when he shared in that dance round the town that he could be part of life, could feel with the common pulse of humanity? Did young Dunbar know life better than he? With him she had lived always and yet did not love him. And then he knew with a flash like lightning through the fog that at this moment, when she was waking to life and was trusting him, he could by only a few words, lead her to love Dunbar. She had always seen him in a commonplace, homely, familiar light, but he, Harkness, if he liked, could show her quite another light, could turn all this fresh romantic impulse that was now flowing towards himself into another channel. But why should he? Was that not simply sentimental idealism? Dunbar was no friend of his, he had never seen him before yesterday, why should he give up to him the only real thing that his life had yet known? But it was not sentimental, it was not false. Youth to youth. In years he was not so old, but in his hesitating, quixotic, undetermined character there were elements of analysis, self-questioning, regret, that would make any human being with whom he was intimately related unhappy. Sitting there, staring out into the fog, he knew the truth--that he was a man doomed to be alone all his days. That did not mean that he could not make much of his life, have many friends, much good fortune--but in the last intimacy he could go to no one and no one could go to him. He bent down and kissed her forehead. She stirred, moved, sat up, resting back against him, her feet on the ground. "Where am I?" she whispered. "Oh yes." She clung to his arm. "No one has come? We are still alone?" "No," he answered her gently, "no one has come. We are still alone." VIII "What time is it?" she asked. He looked at his watch. "Half-past two." "We have missed that train now." "I don't know. And anyway there's probably another." "And David?" "He's lost his way in the fog. He'll turn up at any moment." He stood up and shouted once again: "Dunbar! Dunbar! Dunbar!" No answer. He stood over her looking down at her as she sat with drooping head. She looked up at him. "I'm ashamed at the way I've behaved," she said, "fainting and crying. But you needn't be afraid any more. I shan't give in again." Indeed, he seemed to see in her altogether a new spirit, something finer and more secure. She put out her hand to him.