The tone of his voice came to Clodagh with great distinctness. It seemed the only living thing in a world that had suddenly become dead. While she had been sitting rigid and erect in the stern of the gondola, everything had altered to her mental vision--everything had undergone a fundamental change. The purple twilight; the mysterious night scents; the breezes blown in from the lagoon had become intangible, meaningless things. She was conscious of nothing but Gore's clear words, of her own soul, stripped of its self-deception. At last, with a faint movement, she turned towards him. "Take me home," she said in a numbed voice. "I wish to go home." At the words, he wheeled round in sudden protest. But as his eyes rested on her cold face, a tinge of self-consciousness chilled his zeal--self-consciousness, and the suddenly remembered fact that his own action was, after all, unjustifiable. His own figure suddenly stiffened. "As you wish, of course!" he said quietly. "I suppose my conduct seems quite unpardonable." For one fleeting second an impulse--a desire--crossed Clodagh's face; but as it trembled on the brink of utterance, Gore leant forward in his seat and gave a quick, imperative order to the gondolier. A moment later they had glided up a narrow waterway and emerged again upon the Grand Canal. From the door and windows of Clodagh's hotel, a stream of light was still pouring out upon the water. As they drew level with the terrace, she turned her face away from this searching radiance, and rose quickly to her feet. "Good-night," she said in an almost inarticulate voice--"good-night! Don't stir! Don't help me!" But Gore had risen also. And in a sudden return of his earlier, more impulsive manner, he forgot the self-consciousness that had chilled him. "Mrs. Milbanke----" he said quickly. But Clodagh evaded his eyes; and with a sharp nervous movement, shook her head. "No!" she said--"no! Don't help me! I don't want help!" Stepping past him with an agile movement, she ran up the steps, and across the terrace to the door of the hotel. Obeying a dominant impulse, Gore turned to follow her. But as his foot touched the side of the boat, he paused, drew slowly back, and dropped into his former seat. With almost breathless haste, Clodagh ran up the silent staircase of the hotel, and entering her own room, turned on the light; then, walking straight to the dressing-table, she paused and stared into the mirror at her own reflection. The sight of that reflection was not reassuring. Her face looked colourless, as only olive-tinted skin can look; her wide eyes with their narrowed pupils seemed almost yellow in their intense clearness; while her whole air, her whole appearance, was frightened, tired, pained. As she looked, a nervous panic seized her, and she turned her gaze away.