get out of the habit of taking things for granted."

"Yet it is the one thing we must never do. In this we must trust no one,
and nothing. Then we shall win. If there is no relapse now, the worst,
the slowest part, is over. Soon you will be free, dear girl--and God
bless you forever for what you have been to her and to me."

She answered him only with a wistful smile and when he had gone, she
sighed. She would be free soon, he said. Strange that he could not see
that it was her freedom that she dreaded. Hard as it had been, hard as
it was, there was a still harder time coming--the time when she would be
free--free, to leave forever the man she loved.

The present with its load of duty and anxiety, the constant strain of
watching, its bearing of poor Mary's thousand ingratitudes seemed dear
and desirable when she thought of the black gulf of separation at the
end of the tortuous way. But of course he could not guess. How could he?
Men are so different from women.

She knew, though, that she was coming to the end of her strength. Not
even the doctor guessed how great the strain of those past weeks
had been.

When Mary had awakened to find that her secret was discovered she had
been like a mad thing. There had been rage, tears, protestations,
hysterical denials--finally confession and anguished promises. That she
had never realised the reality of her danger, nor the extent of her
servitude was plain. It seemed easy enough to promise. Esther and the
doctor were making a terrible fuss about nothing, as usual. She grew
sulky under Callandar's warnings and her fury knew no bounds when she
found that certain of her hidden stores had been confiscated. She
demanded that the supply be left in her hands; was not her
promise enough?

But all this was before she knew what denial meant, before she realised
that the way back along the path she had trodden so easily was
thick-set with suffering; that every backward inch must be fought for
with agony and tears. Then she had broken down altogether, had raved and
pleaded. The very knowledge of the depth to which she had fallen,
threatened to send her deeper still. Callandar soon realised that if she
were to be saved it must be in spite of herself. There were but two
points of strength in her weak nature; one the newly awakened, yet
capricious passion for himself, and the other that ruling terror of her
life, which of all her inherent safeguards was the last to give way
under the as