"Here's another night full of the torment and terror of the flesh," he said with difficulty, mouthing each word. "Do you want a drink?" she asked. He shook his head. "The stuff is bitter--but you see--this fear--there's the air and it fills everything--they say it's ten miles high--and a man like myself can't--get enough--you see I'm getting greedy." The mild jest upon his lips was so unwonted that it frightened her. "I'd like to ask you to open the window." She opposed him. "The night air," she urged; "the draught----" But that upset him. "If you can't do me so small a favour in my suffering--" "Forgive me," she said, "it was only my anxiety for you--" She got up and opened the French window that gave upon a narrow balcony. The moonlight flooded the room. Pressing her hands to her breast, she inhaled the first aromatic breath of the night air which cooled and caressed her hot face. "Is it better so?" she asked, turning around. He nodded. "It is better so." Then she stepped out on the balcony. She could scarcely drink her fill of air and moonlight. But she drew back, affrighted. What she had just seen was like an apparition. On the neighbouring balcony stood, clad in white, flowing garments of lace, a woman's figure, and stared with wide open eyes into the moonlight. It was she--her friend. Softly Mary stepped out again and observed her, full of shy curiosity. The moonlight shone full upon the delicate slim face, that seemed to shine with an inner radiance. The eye had a yearning glow. A smile, ecstatic and fearful at once, made the lips quiver, and the hands that grasped the iron railing pulsed as if in fear and expectation. Mary heard her own heart begin to beat. A hot flush rose into her face? What was all that? What did it mean? Such a look, such a smile, she had never seen in her life. And yet both seemed infinitely familiar to her. Thus a woman must look who-- She had no time to complete the thought, for a fit of coughing recalled her to Nathaniel. A motion of his hand directed her to close the window and the shutters. It would have been better never to have opened them. Better for her, too, perhaps. Then she sat down next to him and held his head until the paroxysm was over. He sank back, utterly exhausted. His hand groped for hers. With abstracted caresses she touched his weary fingers. Her thoughts dwelt with that white picture without. That poignant feeling of happiness that she had almost lost during the past few days, arose in her with a hitherto unknown might. And now the sick man began to speak. "You have always been good to me, Mary," he said. "You have always had patience with me." "Ah, don't speak so," she murmured. "And I wish I could say as full of assurance as you could before the throne of God: 'Father, I have been true to the duty which you have allotted to me.'"