With a cry of horror, bathed from head to foot in perspiration, Tristan started from his slumber. The moonbeams flooded the chamber. The soft breeze of the summer night stole through the open casement. With a moan as of mortal pain he sat up and looked about. Was he indeed in Rome? Had it been but a dream, this echo of the past, this visualized parting from the woman he had loved better than life? Was he indeed in Rome, to do as she had bid him do, not in the misty, flower-scented rose-gardens of Avalon in far Provence?-- And she--Hellayne--where was she at this hour? Tristan stroked his clammy brow with a hot, dry hand. For a moment the memories evoked by the magic wand of the God of Sleep seemed to banish all consciousness of the present. He cast a fleeting, bewildered glance at the dim, distant housetops, then fell back among his cushions, his lips muttering the name of her who had filled his dream with her never-to-be-forgotten presence, wondering and questioning if they would ever meet again. Thus he tossed and tossed. After a time he became still. Once again consciousness was blotted out and the dream realm reigned supreme. CHAPTER IV THE WAY OF THE CROSS It was late on the following morning when Tristan waked. The sun was high in the heavens and the perfumes from a thousand gardens were wafted to his nostrils. He looked about bewildered. The dream phantoms of the night still held his senses captive, and it was some time ere he came to a realization of the present. In the dream of the night he had lived over a scene in the past, conjuring back the memory of one who had sent him on the Way of the Cross. The pitiless rays of the Roman sun, which began to envelop the white houses and walls, brought with them the realization of the present hour. He had come to Rome to do penance, to start life anew and to forget. So she had bade him do on that never-to-be forgotten eve of their parting. So she had willed it, and he had obeyed. How it all flooded back to him again in waves of anguish, the memory of those days when the turrets of Avalon had faded from his aching sight, when, together with a motley pilgrims' throng, he had tramped the dusty sun-baked road, dead to all about him save the love that was cushioned in his heart. How that parting from Hellayne still dominated all other events, even though life and the world had fallen away from him and he had only prayer for oblivion, for obliteration.