His smile struck her dumb. It was more convincing than his words. "But why?" she said presently. "Why--why--_why_?" "Because I won't; because it's wrong. My father ought never to have married. He had no right to bring me into the world to suffer like this. It's a crime. And I'll not be a criminal. Not even for you--not even for you. You'll forgive me--won't you? I didn't know--and--oh, what's the use of talking?" Yet they talked for hours. Conventionally he should have torn himself away, unable to bear the strain of his agony. As a matter of fact, he sat by her holding her hand. It was for the last time--the last, last time. There was really a third at that interview. The Onlooker had imagination enough to see the scene between the parting lovers. They parted. And now the Onlooker dared not meet her--dared not call at the house as he had used to do. At last--the father pressed him--he went. He met her. And it was as though he had met the ghost of her whom he had loved. Her eyes had blue marks under them, her chin had grown more pointed, her nose sharper. There was a new line on her forehead, and her eyes had changed. Over the wine he heard from the father that she was pining for the Lover who had inherited heart disease. "I suppose it was you who saw him, by the way," said he, "a tall, well-set-up young fellow--dark--not bad looking." "I--I don't remember," lied the Onlooker, with the eyes of his memory on the white face of the man he had stabbed. Now the Lover and the Onlooker had each his own burden to bear. And the Lover's was the easier. He worked still, though there was now nothing to work for more; he worked as he had never worked in his life, because he knew that if he did not take to work he should take to drink or worse devils, and he set his teeth and swore that her Lover should not be degraded. He knew that she loved him, and there was a kind of fierce pain-pleasure--like that of scratching a sore--in the thought that she was as wretched as he was, that, divided in all else, they were yet united in their suffering. He thought it made him more miserable to know of her misery. But it didn't. He never saw her, but he dreamed of her, and sometimes the dreams got out of hand, and carried him a thousand worlds from all that lay between them. Then he had to wake up. And that was bad.