"Forgive me my little game," he said. "It is all part of my theory. To be above these things, you know. What would happen to me if I surrendered to all that beauty?" The eyes that looked into Harkness's face were pathetic, caged, wistful, longing. And they were mad. Somewhere deep within him his soul, caught in the wreckage of his bodily life like a human being pinned beneath a ruined train, besought--yes, besought Harkness for deliverance. But he had no thought at that moment of anything but his own escape. To flee from that room--from that room at any cost! He said something. Crispin did not try to keep him. They moved together into the hall. "And you won't allow my chauffeur to drive you back?" "No, no thank you, I shall love the walk." "Well, well. It has been delightful. We shall meet some day again I have no doubt. . . ." Silence flooded the house. Once more Harkness's hand touched that other soft one. The door was open. The lovely night air brushed his face, and he had stepped into the dim star-drenched garden. The door closed. PART III: THE SEA-FOG I In the garden the silence was like a warning, as though the night had her finger to her lips holding back a multitude of breathing, deeply interested spectators. Harkness, slipping from the path on to the lawn, felt a relief, as though with the touch of his foot on the cool turf there had come a freedom from imprisonment. The garden was so friendly, so safe, so homely in its welcome. The scent of roses that had seemed to follow him throughout the adventures of that queer evening came to him now as though crowding up to reassure him. The night sky pierced with stars, but they were thick and dim seen through a veil of mist. The trees of the garden, like serried ranks of giants in black armour, seemed to stand, in silent attention, on every side of him, awaiting his orders. The voice of all this world was the sea stirring, with a sigh and a whisper, below the wall of rock. His first impulse as he stood on the lawn was to go away as far as he could from that house. Yes, as far as ever he could--miles and miles and miles--China if you like. Ah, no! That was just where that man would be! He was trembling and shaking and wiping his forehead with his handkerchief; the breeze stroked him with cool fingers. He must run for ever to be clear of that house--and then suddenly remembered that he must not run because he had his duty to do--and even as he remembered that a figure stepped up to him out of the trees. He would have called out--so wild and trembling were his nerves--had he not at once recognized from his great size that this was Jabez the fisherman. He might have been an incarnation of the night with his deep black beard, his grave kindly face, and his simple, natural quiet. He was dressed in his fisherman's jersey and blue trousers and had no covering on his head.