Over the telephone he said: "Ruth dear, I'll be right there. Walked all night. Got straightened out now. I'm out at Mineola. It's all right with me now, blessed. I want so frightfully much to make it all right with you. I'll be there in about an hour." She answered "Yes" so non-committally that he was smitten by the fact that he had yet to win forgiveness for his frenzy in leaving her; that he must break the shell of resentment which would incase her after a whole night's brooding between sullen walls. On the train, unconscious of its uproar, he was bespelled by his new love. During a few moments of their lives, ordinary real people, people real as a tooth-brush, do actually transcend the coarsely physical aspects of sex and feeding, and do approximate to the unwavering glow of romantic heroes. Carl was no more a romantic hero-lover than, as a celebrated aviator, he had been a hero-adventurer. He was a human being. He was not even admirable, except as all people are admirable, from the ash-man to the king. There had been nothing exemplary in his struggle to find adjustment with his wife; he had been bad in his impatience just as he had been good in his boyish affection; in both he had been human. Even now, when without reserve he gave himself up to love, he was aware that he would ascend, not on godlike pinions, but by a jerky old apartment-house elevator, to make peace with a vexed girl who was also a human being, with a digestive system and prejudices. Yet with a joy that encompassed all the beauty of banners and saluting swords, romantic towers and a fugitive queen, a joy transcending trains and elevators and prejudices, Carl knew that human girl as the symbol of man's yearning for union with the divine; he desired happiness for her with a devotion great as the passion in Galahad's heart when all night he knelt before the high altar. He came slowly up to their apartment-house. If it were only possible for Ruth to trust him, now---- Mingled with his painfully clear remembrance of all the sweet things Ruth was and had done was a tragic astonishment that he--this same he who was all hers now--could possibly have turned impatiently from her sobs. Yet it would have been for good, if only she would trust him. Not till he left the elevator, on their floor, did he comprehend that Ruth might not be awaiting him; might have gone. He looked irresolutely at the grill of the elevator door, shut on the black shaft. "She was here when I telephoned----" He waited. Perhaps she would peep out to see if it was he who had come up in the elevator. She did not appear.