Anisty held her fingers in his hard palm for an instant, rising from his chair. "Good-by, my dear," he said clumsily. He watched her disappear, eyes humid, temples throbbing. "By the powers!" he cried. "But she's worth it!" Perhaps his meaning was vague, even to himself. He resumed his seat mechanically and sat for a time staring dreamily into vacancy, blunt fingers drumming on the cloth. "No," he declared at length. "No; I'm safe enough ... in _her_ hands." * * * * * Once secure from the public gaze, the girl crowded back into a corner of the cab, as though trying to efface herself. Her eyes closed almost automatically; the curve of laughing lips became a doleful droop; a crinkle appeared between the arched brows; waves of burning crimson flooded her face and throat. In her lap both hands lay clenched into tiny fists--clenched so tightly that it hurt, numbing her fingers: a physical pain that, somehow, helped her to endure the paroxysms of shame. That she should have stooped so low!... Presently the fingers relaxed, and her whole frame relaxed in sympathy. The black squall had passed over; but now were the once tranquil waters ruffled and angry. Then languor gripped her like an enemy: she lay listless in its hold, sick and faint with disgust of self. This was her all-sufficient punishment: to have done what she had done, to be about to do what she contemplated. For she had set her hand to the plow: there must now be no drawing back, however hateful might prove her task.... The voice of the cabby dropping through the trap, roused her. "This is the Martha Washington, ma'am." Mechanically she descended from the hansom and paid her fare; then, summoning up all her strength and resolution, passed into the lobby of the hotel and paused at the telephone switchboard. VIII DANCE OF THE HOURS Four P. M. The old clock in a corner of the study chimed resonantly and with deliberation: four double strokes; and while yet the deep-throated music was dying into silence the telephone bell shrieked impertinently. Maitland bit savagely on the gag and knotted his brows, trying to bear it. The effect was that of a coarse file rasped across raw quivering nerves. And he lay helpless, able to do no more toward endurance than to dig nails deep into his palms. Again and again the fiendish clamor shattered the echoes. Blinding flashes of agony danced down the white-hot wires strung through his head, taut from temple to temple. Would the fool at the other end never be satisfied that he could get no answer? Evidently not: the racket continued mercilessly, short series of shrill calls alternating with imperative rolls prolonged until one thought that the tortured metal sounding-cups would crack. Thought! nay, prayed that either such would be the case, or else that one's head might at once mercifully be rent asunder....