"I was wrong," he said. "But I think you would be sorry to have me face--what I am facing now. You were always so forgiving, Alix; you would be the first to be sorry." He put his hand over the tigerish pain that was beginning to reach his heart. His throat felt thick and choked, and still he did not cry. "An hour ago," he said, "if it had been that the least thought of what this meant to you might have reached me an hour ago, it would not have been too late. Alix, one look into your eyes an hour ago might have saved us all! Fred," Peter said aloud, with a bitter groan, clinching tight the hands of the old friend who had crept in to stand beside him "Fred, she was here, in all her health and joy and strength only today. And now--" "I know--old man--" the other man muttered. He looked anxiously at Peter's terrible face. In the silence the dog whimpered faintly. But when Peter, after an endless five minutes, turned away, it was to speak to his friend in an almost normal voice. "I must go down and see Cherry, Fred. She took her husband to the old house; they were living there." "Helen will stay here," the man assured him, quickly. "I'll drive you down and come back here. We thought perhaps a few of us could come here to-morrow afternoon, Peter," he added timidly, with his reddened eyes filling again, "and talk of her a little, and pray for her a little, and then take her to--to rest beside the old doctor--" "I hadn't thought about that," Peter answered, still with the air of finding it hard to link words to thought. "But that is the way she would like it. Thank you--and thank Helen for me--" "Oh, Peter, to do anything--" the woman faltered. "She came to us, you know, when the baby was so ill--day after day--my own sister couldn't have been more to us!" "Did she?" Peter asked, staring at the speaker steadily. "That was like her." He went out of the house and got into a waiting car, and they drove down the mountain. Alix had driven him over this road day before yesterday--yesterday--no, it was today, he remembered. "Thank God I don't feel it yet as I shall feel it, Thompson!" he said, quietly. The man who was driving gave him an anxious glance. "You must take each day as it comes," he answered, simply. Peter nodded, folded his arms across his chest, and stared into the early dark. There was no other way to go than past the very spot where the horror had occurred, but Thompson told his wife later that poor Joyce had not seemed to know it when they passed it. Nor did he give any evidence of emotion when they reached the old Strickland house and entered the old hallway where Cherry had come flying in, a few short years ago, with Martin's first kiss upon her lips.