She heard the servant open the front door; there was a pause--Jason was taking off his greatcoat--after which he entered, calm and without query. “I was tired of sitting by myself,” she said with an air of entire frankness. In a minute or so more it was all as it had been the evening before--she held a coal for his cheroot as he tilted back beside her with his feet on the rail. “You are a very comfortable man, Jason,” she told him. He made no reply, although a quiver crossed his lips. Then, after a little, “It's astonishing how soon you get used to things. Seems as if I had been here for years, and this is only the third time.'” “Have you thought any more of California?” He faced her with an expression of surprise. “It had gone clean out of my mind. I suppose I will shift back, though--nothing here for me. I can't come to see you every evening.” She preserved a silence in which they both fell to staring into a dancing, bluish flame. The gusts of rain were audible like the tearing of heavy linen. An extraordinary idea had taken possession of Honora--if the day had been fine, if she had been out in a sparkling air and sun, a very great deal would have happened differently. But just what she couldn't then say: the fact alone was all that she curiously apprehended. “I suppose not,” she answered, so long after his last statement that he gazed questioningly at her. “I wonder if it has occurred to you,” she continued, “how much alike we are? I often think about it.” “Why, no,” he replied, “it hasn't. Jason Bur-rage and Honora Canderay! I wouldn't have guessed it, and I don't believe any one else ever has. I'd have a hard time thinking about two more different. It's--it's ridiculous.” He became seriously animated. “Here I am--well, you know all about me--with some money, perhaps, and a little of the world in my head; but you're Honora Canderay.” “You said once that I was nothing but a woman,” she reminded him. “I remember that,” he admitted with evident chagrin. “I was drunk.” “That's when the truth is often hit on; I am quite an ordinary sort of woman.” He laughed indulgently. “You said last evening I had some of a very common quality.” “Now you mustn't take that serious,” he protested; “it was just in a way of speech. I told you I couldn't rightly explain myself.” “Anyhow,” she asserted bluntly, “I am lonely. What will you do about it?” His amazement turned into a consternation which even now she found almost laughable. “Me?” he stammered. “There's no way I can help you. You are having a joke.” She realized, with a feeling that her knowledge came too late, that she was entirely serious. Jason Burrage was the only being alive who could give her any assistance, yes, save her from the future. Her hands were cold, she felt absolutely still, as if she had suddenly turned into marble, a statue with a heart slightly fluttering.