Now I knew why my enemy had guided me to those books, that I might read, fill my mind with the poison of vile thoughts, and destroy the comradeship that bound me to Desire Michell. How should I find her? How free us both? The clock in the hall downstairs struck a single bell. With dull surprise I realized that considerable time had passed while I sat there. Still I did not move, weighed down by a profound discouragement. Suddenly, as a wave will run up a beach in advance of the incoming tide, impelled by some deep stir in the ocean's secret places, an icy surge rushed about my feet. Deathly cold from that current struck through my whole body. My heart shuddered and staggered in its beating from pure shock. "_Go! Not tomorrow, not at dawn, but now!_" The wave seeped back, receded away from me down its invisible beach. Desire's warning hammered at my mind, striving to burst some barred door to reach the consciousness within that had loitered too long. This was the new peril. This was what I had fled from, unknowing the source of my panic, the night before. This was death. A second surge struck me with the heavy shock of a veritable wave from some bitter ocean. This time the tide rose to my knees; boiling and hissing in its rush. Blood and nerves seemed to freeze. I felt my heart stop, then reel on like a broken thing. Flecks of crimson spattered like foam against my eyelids. The wave broke. The mass poured down the beach, tugging at me in its retreat. With the last strength ebbing away from me with that receding current, I dragged the chain of the lamp beside me. The comfort of light springing up in the room! The relief of seeing normal, pleasant surroundings! Truly light is an elixir of courage to man. That cold had paralyzed me. I had no force to rise. Nor did I altogether wish to rise and go. I had lost Desire tonight. Was I to lose my self-respect also? Was I to run a beaten man from this peril, after standing against my enemy so long? Should I not rather stand on this my ground where I was not the "lame feller"? Down by the lake, the snarling cry of a terrified cat broke the night stillness. It was Bagheera's voice. The cry was followed by sounds indicating a small animal's frantic flight through the thickets of goldenrod and willow that edged the banks of the stream below the dam. The series of progressive crashes passed back of the house and continued on, dying away down the creek. As I braced my startled nerves after this outbreak of noise, the light was withdrawn from every lamp in the room. At the same moment, the electric torch rolled off my table and fell to the floor. I heard its progress across the muffling softness of the rug, across the polished wood beyond, and final stoppage at some point out of my reach.