Ten minutes later he knew. They pointed to a gap in the railings close by, made some while before by a lorry that had run out of control along the Marine Parade. The Urban District Council ought to have repaired the railings immediately after the accident, and he (somebody in the crowd) would not be surprised if the coroner censured the Council pretty severely at the inquest. The gap was a positive death-trap for anybody walking along at night and not looking carefully ahead. And _he_ (somebody else in the crowd) suggested the possibility of making the Seacliffe Urban District Council pay heavy damages.... Of course, it was an accident.... There was a bad bruise on the head: that was where she must have struck the stones as she fell.... And in one of the pockets was a torn kinema ticket; clearly she had been on her way home from the Beach kinema.... Once again, it was the Council's fault for not promptly repairing the dangerous gap in the railings. They led him back to the Beach Hotel and gave him brandy. He kept saying: "Now please go--I'm quite all right.... There's really nothing that anybody can do for me.... Please go now...." When at last he was alone in the cheerless hotel bedroom he sat down on the side of the bed and cried. Not for sorrow or pity or terror, but merely to relieve some fearful strain of emotion that was in him. Helen dead! He could hardly force himself to believe it, but when he did he felt sorry, achingly sorry, because there had been so many bonds between them, so many bonds that only death could have snapped. He saw her now, poor little woman, as he had never seen her before; the love in her still living, and all that had made them unhappy together vanished away. He loved her, those minutes in the empty, cheerless bedroom, more calmly than he had ever loved her when she had been near to him. And--strange miracle!--she had given him peace at last. Pity for her no longer overwhelmed him with its sickly torture; he was calm, calm with sorrow, but calm. VI