They passed with a muffled din through the single street of a sleeping village, leaving behind a confusion of echoes and the startled barking of a dog. Anthony could see Annot's profile, pale and clear, against the flying and formless countryside; the lace about her hair fluttered ceaselessly; and her wrap bellowed and clung about her shoulders, about her gloveless hands folded upon her slim knees. She was splendidly, regally scornful upon the wings of their reckless flight; the throttle was wide open; they swung from side to side, hung on a single wheel, lunged bodily into the air. In the mad ecstasy of speed she rose; but Anthony, clutching her arms, pulled her sharply into the seat. Then, decisively, he shut off the power, the world ceased to race behind them, the smooth clamor of the engine sank to a low vibratone. “You did that wonderfully,” she told him with glowing cheeks, shining eyes; “it was marvellous. A moment like that is worth a life-time on foot... laughing at death, at everything that is safe, admirable, moral... a moment of the freedom of soulless things, savage and unaccountable to God or society.” The illuminated face of the clock before him indicated a few minutes past one, and, tentatively, he repeated the time. “How stupid of you,” she protested; “silly, little footrule of the hours, the conventional measure of the commonplace. For punishment--on and on. Like Columbus' men you are afraid of falling over the edge of--propriety.” She turned to him with solemn eyes. “I assure you there is no edge, no bump or brimstone, no place where good stops and tumbles into bad; it's all continuous--” He lost the thread of her mocking discourse, and glanced swiftly at her, his brow wrinkled, the shadow of a smile upon his lips. “Heavens! but you are good-looking,” she acknowledged, her countenance studiously critical, impersonal. After that silence once more fell upon them; the machine sang through the dark, lifting over ridges, dropping down declines. Anthony had long since lost all sense of their position. The cyanite depths of the sky turned grey, cold; there was a feeling in the air of settling dew; a dank mist filled the hollows; the color seemed suddenly to have faded from the world. He felt unaccountably weary, inexpressibly depressed; he could almost taste the vapidity of further existence. Annoys hard, bright words echoed in his brain; the flame of his unthinking idealism sank in the thin atmosphere of their logic. XLII