“Yes,” she insisted. “Oh, Dick! it has been hateful of me, but do you know what helped me to pull myself together? It was knowing you--you loved me ... and admired me. It was such a long time since I had known that any man felt that.... It was mean of me, contemptible--but somehow it helped me awfully. It gave me back my self-esteem. It flattered my vanity.... Dick, don’t you _hate_ me?” He laughed gently. “Did you think I didn’t know it?” he said. “Did you think I wasn’t glad?” With a sudden movement she rose, and, facing him, spoke urgently, almost imperatively. “Dick,” she said, “I’m going to say to you what you said to me two years ago. Don’t waste your life over one human being. The world is wide, and it’s before you. And you’re a strong man. Go, and forget me.” “I shall go,” said Mayne, briefly. “When?” She faltered a little over the word. “To-morrow.” She was silent, looking at him; trying to realize life without him. “The sooner the better,” he said, at last, drawing a long breath. “I’m used to setting out for nowhere at a moment’s notice, you see. So this will be our farewell feast, Cis. You’ll drink to my--to my success?” “To your happiness, Dick,” she whispered, in a shaking voice. Mayne looked at her again with such a long gaze that her eyes sank. “Cecily,” he said at last, huskily, “we’ve known each other for a long time. Do you know the years I’ve loved you?... And perhaps I shall not come back.... May I kiss you once--just to remember all my life?” She looked at him gravely. “Yes, Dick,” she answered. With a half cry, Mayne drew her into his arms, and put his lips to hers. It was the kiss he had dreamed of for years; a kiss that in a rapture of mingled torture and delight expressed all that for years he had felt for the woman he held for one brief moment like a lover. A colored mist swam before him as he raised his head. He felt Cecily gently disengage herself, and it was the silence in the room that cleared his brain, and then his sight. Kingslake was standing just inside the door. For a moment the stillness seemed to press upon the air like a visible, tangible weight before it was broken by Robert’s savage laugh. “What liars you women are,” he said, slowly, under his breath, his eyes upon his wife. “Aren’t you? All of you! All alike!” Mayne made a menacing step towards him. “Be careful what you say!” he began, in as low a voice. “We’d better be alone. Cecily,”--he turned to her--“will you go?” “No,” she said, quietly. “I prefer to stay.” She looked past Mayne at her husband. “All I said to you just now is true----” He laughed again. “You take a low view of my intelligence, my dear child.”