"That is nothing new to me," she said. "Only one man has offered that."

"Why didn't you take him?" he asked, with an ugly laugh.

"I couldn't. I cared for you."

"And now," he said, "are you afraid of me?"

"Yes--a little."

He leaned forward suddenly, "You'd better steer clear of me!" Her
startled eyes beheld in him a change as swift as his words.

"Fair warning!" he added: "look out for yourself." Everything that was
brutal in him; everything ruthless and violent had marred his features
so that all in a moment the mouth had grown ugly and a hard, bruised
look stamped the pallid muscles of his features and twitched at them.

"You're taking chances from now on," he said. "I told you once to let me
alone. You'd better do it now. And--" he stared at the distant man--"I
told you that hate is more vital than love. It is. I've waited a long
time to strike. Even now it isn't in me to do it as I have meant to
do it. And so I tell you to keep away from me; and I'll strike in the
old-fashioned way, and end it--to-night."

Stunned by his sudden and dreadful metamorphosis, her ears ringing with
his disjointed incoherencies, she rose, scarcely knowing what she was
doing, scarcely conscious that he was beside her, moving lightly and in
silence out into the brilliant darkness of the streets.

It was only at her own door that he spoke again: standing there on the
shabby steps of her boarding-house, the light from the transom yellowing
his ghastly face.

"Something snapped"--he passed an unsteady hand across his eyes;--"I
care very deeply for you. I--they'll make over to you--what I have. You
can study on it--live on it, modestly--"

"W-what is the matter? Are you ill?" she stammered, white and
frightened.

But he only muttered that she had her warning and that she should keep
away from him, and that it would not be long before she should have an
opportunity in life. And he went his way not looking back.

When he reached his studio the hall was dark. As he turned the key he
thought he heard something stirring in the shadows, but went in--leaving
the door into the hallway open--and straight on across the room to his
desk.

He was putting something into his coat pocket, and his back was still
turned to the open door when Graylock stepped quietly across the
threshold; and Drene heard him, but closed his desk, leisurely, and
then, as leisurely, turned, knowing who had entered.

And so they stood alone together after m