They were passing a light and he drew her closer to it. “What has happened to you?” he whispered to her aghast when he had searched her through and through with his eyes. Then, “_Who are you?_” He had made, he realized, some frightful mistake; how he could have come to make it, he did not know. “You’re not Cynthia Gail!” he cried. For an instant, that discovery was enough for him. The agony which he had been suffering this last half hour was not real; the girl whom he had found on the street never had been his; they had both been going about only in some grotesque error. “No; I’m not Cynthia Gail,” Ruth told him. “Then where is she?” he demanded. “Where is my Cynthia?” His hands were upon Ruth and he shook her a little in the passion of his demand. He could not even begin to suspect the truth; but--from sight of her now--fear flicked him. If this girl was not Cynthia---- “How are you so like her?” he put his challenge aloud. “Why did you pretend to be her? Why? You tell me why!” “I’ll tell you,” Ruth said. “But not here.” “Where?” “We must find some place where we can talk undisturbed; where we can have a long talk.” “Take me to her, first. That’s all I care about. I don’t care about you--or why you did that. I don’t care, I say. Take me to Cynthia; or I’ll go there.” He started away toward the Rue des Saints Pères and the _pension_; so Ruth swiftly caught his sleeve. “You can’t go to her!” Ruth gasped to him. “She’s not there. Believe me, you can’t find her!” “Why not?” “She’s--we must find some place, Mr. Byrne!” “She’s--what? Killed? Killed, you were going to say?” “Yes; she’s been killed.” “In Picardy, you mean? Where? How? Why, she was at her rooms two hours ago. Miss Wetherell told me; or was she lying to me?” “I was at the rooms two hours ago,” Ruth said. “Miss Wetherell knows me as Cynthia Gail. I’ve been Cynthia Gail since January.” “What do you mean? How?” “Cynthia Gail died in January, Mr. Byrne.” “What? How? Where?” “She was killed--in Chicago.” “That’s a lie! Why, I’ve been hearing from her myself.” “You’ve been hearing from me. I’m Cynthia Gail, I tell you. I’ve been Cynthia Gail since January.” He caught another glimpse of her face; and his impetuousness to start to the Rue des Saints Pères collapsed, pitifully. “Where shall we go?” he asked.