up the chant: "he's--a
jolly good fellow." His brief reply, on those occasions, seemed always
to indicate that, whatever else he might be, a jolly good fellow he was
not. But by Zuleika's eulogy he really was touched. "Thank you--thank
you," he gasped; and there were tears in his eyes. Dear the thought that
she so revered him, so wished him not to die. But this was no more than
a rush-light in the austere radiance of his joy in dying for her.

And the time was come. Now for the sacrament of his immersion in
infinity.

"Good-bye," he said simply, and was about to swing himself on to the
ledge of the balustrade. Zuleika, divining his intention, made way for
him. Her bosom heaved quickly, quickly. All colour had left her face;
but her eyes shone as never before.

Already his foot was on the ledge, when hark! the sound of a distant
gun. To Zuleika, with all the chords of her soul strung to the utmost
tensity, the effect was as if she herself had been shot; and she
clutched at the Duke's arm, like a frightened child. He laughed. "It was
the signal for the race," he said, and laughed again, rather bitterly,
at the crude and trivial interruption of high matters.

"The race?" She laughed hysterically.

"Yes. 'They're off'." He mingled his laughter with hers, gently seeking
to disengage his arm. "And perhaps," he said, "I, clinging to the weeds
of the river's bed, shall see dimly the boats and the oars pass over me,
and shall be able to gurgle a cheer for Judas."

"Don't!" she shuddered, with a woman's notion that a jest means levity.
A tumult of thoughts surged in her, all confused. She only knew that
he must not die--not yet! A moment ago, his death would have been
beautiful. Not now! Her grip of his arm tightened. Only by breaking her
wrist could he have freed himself. A moment ago, she had been in the
seventh-heaven... Men were supposed to have died for love of her. It
had never been proved. There had always been something--card-debts,
ill-health, what not--to account for the tragedy. No man, to the best
of her recollection, had ever hinted that he was going to die for her.
Never, assuredly, had she seen the deed done. And then came he, the
first man she had loved, going to die here, before her eyes, because she
no longer loved him. But she knew now that he must not die--not yet!

All around her was the hush that falls on Oxford when the signal for the
race has sounded. In the distance could be heard faintly the noise