Two faces looked back at him from the rear windows of this omnibus; and a hand waved through the open door. And above the omnibus, smoothly, and without effort, moved a faint shadow of misty Cloud. It seemed to Barnard to grow darker as the omnibus drew further and further away; and when the vehicle disappeared, the Cloud remained for a moment in his sight before it, too, vanished. There was something menacing about this drifting mist. Barnard thought of it, in his dream, as The Threat. When the omnibus was gone, he remembered the faces which had looked back at him, and recognized them. His mother, and his brother. His brother was a baby. Barnard, in his dream, felt an overpowering terror at this recognition, and he shuddered. Then that misty, shadowy picture was gone, and another took its place. He saw himself at home, sitting in a low chair before a coal fire, with his chin in his hand. His Aunt Joan stood beside him. She was crying, and she kept patting his head. “You’re a brave boy, not to cry,” she said to him, over and over. “You’re a brave boy not to cry.” At the same time, she wept bitterly. Barnard, in his dream, had no desire to cry. He was puzzled and uneasy; he groped for understanding. Understanding came with a last glimpse of the baby’s face in the omnibus, and The Threat gliding above, and then he saw in his dream a bit of yellow paper, and on it, written in a long, flowing, telegrapher’s hand, the words: “Rob died today at noon.” He understood that Rob was his baby brother; and he understood, from that time forward, the nature of The Threat.... III Thus, his dream, even while he was still a boy in it, was always disturbing and perplexing. He was uneasy, rebellious. He chafed and suffered and could not find relief. The dream world was hostile and mocking, full of inscrutable forces which were stronger than himself. But he could not wake up. The dream dragged him inexorably onward. He was like a man bound to the stirrup of a horse, jerked forward constantly, and meeting each instant new blows and pains. Abruptly, at length, as when at dawn the sun strikes low and sweet across the dewy fields, the complexion of his dream was altered. He smiled in his sleep, and he felt warm and comforted. He did not know why this was so, and at first he did not care. He had been conscious that his dreams were of a more pleasant hue for some time before he discovered that this new aspect was shared with him by another. A girl. He saw her very plainly, and there was something familiar about her, and at the same time something baffling. He felt that he ought to recognize her, that he ought to know her name. He tried to remember it, but he could not. So he set this problem aside, and gave himself up to enjoyment of the dream with her. He could see no more of her than her face, her eyes. They were near each other, yet aloof. Their hands never touched, they never spoke; yet their eyes met frequently.