His tones were not raised; there was nothing particularly eloquent in the actual words he spoke. But to me they tolled like a great bell--a bell that tolls while the iron gates of hell are opening slowly.... "Yes, too late!" Connie said quickly. "And you see it now! It could never have been. And now you will let us go! Oh, be quick! Untie John, please do; it must be hurting him so!" For the first and last time that night two tears rolled down my cheeks. I suppose that for a brief space there had been some lingering nobility in Helzephron's mind, some flicker of life in that dark soul. The man had not always been under the dominion of evil. But now I saw, without possibility of mistake, the final eclipse of good. It was a visible thing, the last awful act in the terrible drama of his life, and it took place before one's eyes like crystals dissolving in a glass. He looked steadfastly at Constance. "Sir John can go," he said, "for all the debt of ill-will I owe him, he can go from here unharmed. My dear girl, it rests entirely with you!" She did not understand. "Oh, then let him go now, at once." "That man," he answered, "lives, or dies a peculiarly unpleasant death; goes free, or is nothing but a heap of clothes in half an hour, as you shall decide, Constance." By the slow dilation of her eyes, I think she knew what he would say. "It is like this," he went on. "If I cannot have Love, the real thing, at least Fate has put it in my power to demand--and have!--the second best, the semblance of it. The moment that you give me your solemn promise to marry me, Sir John walks out on to the moor." I gave Constance one swift, warning look. Would the man believe that another was as base as he himself? Everything depended on that. "You cannot do it, Constance," I said, with a careful tremor in my voice, trying to suggest a slight dawn of hope, and again I sent her a signal of caution. Helzephron gave an almost imperceptible start, and a faint smile began to play about his cruel lips. The fish was rising. "It would be a martyrdom," I went on. "What is my life worth--even to the State"--I thought that was a clever touch--"in exchange for such a sacrifice?" Praise God for her quick wits! She saw that I was acting, and fell into her part with supreme naturalness. A wail of pain came from her, and she covered her face with her hands. "I cannot let you die," she cried. "Do I not love you? Is not your life of supreme value?" I spoke in a tone of hardly veiled eagerness: "But your own happiness, what of that?" Connie made a passionate gesture of renunciation. She turned to our torturer. "Sir," she said, "have you no mercy, no compassion?" "I have nothing but one overmastering need." "Then leave us. Let me be alone with Sir John for a few minutes." She beckoned to him and he came, leaning his head low. "Go," she whispered. "I cannot persuade him while you are here. Leave us alone and I will do my best."