The clock struck another hour--eleven. She stood up again and walked to the door: she thought she would go up stairs to her room. _Her_ room? Again the word derided her. She opened the door, crossed the narrow hall, and walked up the stairs. As she passed, she noticed Westall's sticks and umbrellas: a pair of his gloves lay on the hall table. The same stair-carpet mounted between the same walls; the same old French print, in its narrow black frame, faced her on the landing. This visual continuity was intolerable. Within, a gaping chasm; without, the same untroubled and familiar surface. She must get away from it before she could attempt to think. But, once in her room, she sat down on the lounge, a stupor creeping over her... Gradually her vision cleared. A great deal had happened in the interval--a wild marching and countermarching of emotions, arguments, ideas--a fury of insurgent impulses that fell back spent upon themselves. She had tried, at first, to rally, to organize these chaotic forces. There must be help somewhere, if only she could master the inner tumult. Life could not be broken off short like this, for a whim, a fancy; the law itself would side with her, would defend her. The law? What claim had she upon it? She was the prisoner of her own choice: she had been her own legislator, and she was the predestined victim of the code she had devised. But this was grotesque, intolerable--a mad mistake, for which she could not be held accountable! The law she had despised was still there, might still be invoked...invoked, but to what end? Could she ask it to chain Westall to her side? _She_ had been allowed to go free when she claimed her freedom--should she show less magnanimity than she had exacted? Magnanimity? The word lashed her with its irony--one does not strike an attitude when one is fighting for life! She would threaten, grovel, cajole...she would yield anything to keep her hold on happiness. Ah, but the difficulty lay deeper! The law could not help her--her own apostasy could not help her. She was the victim of the theories she renounced. It was as though some giant machine of her own making had caught her up in its wheels and was grinding her to atoms...