uld grace any station in
life. He had always been rather in awe of her. It was a fine thing to be
suddenly loved by her, to be in a position to over-rule her every whim.
Plighting his troth, he had feared she would be an encumbrance, only to
find she was a lever. But--was he deeply in love with her? How was it
that he could not at this moment recall her features, or the tone of her
voice, while of deplorable Miss Dobson, every lineament, every accent,
so vividly haunted him? Try as he would to beat off these memories, he
failed, and--some very great pressure here!--was glad he failed; glad
though he found himself relapsing to the self-contempt from which Miss
Batch had raised him. He scorned himself for being alive. And again, he
scorned himself for his infidelity. Yet he was glad he could not forget
that face, that voice--that queen. She had smiled at him when she
borrowed the ring. She had said "Thank you." Oh, and now, at this very
moment, sleeping or waking, actually she was somewhere--she! herself!
This was an incredible, an indubitable, an all-magical fact for the
little fellow.

From the street below came a faint cry that was as the cry of his own
heart, uttered by her own lips. Quaking, he peered down, and dimly saw,
over the way, a cloaked woman.

She--yes, it was she herself--came gliding to the middle of the road,
gazing up at him.

"At last!" he heard her say. His instinct was to hide himself from the
queen he had not died for. Yet he could not move.

"Or," she quavered, "are you a phantom sent to mock me? Speak!"

"Good evening," he said huskily.

"I knew," she murmured, "I knew the gods were not so cruel. Oh man of my
need," she cried, stretching out her arms to him, "oh heaven-sent, I see
you only as a dark outline against the light of your room. But I know
you. Your name is Noaks, isn't it? Dobson is mine. I am your Warden's
grand-daughter. I am faint and foot-sore. I have ranged this desert city
in search of--of YOU. Let me hear from your own lips that you love me.
Tell me in your own words--" She broke off with a little scream, and did
not stand with forefinger pointed at him, gazing, gasping.

"Listen, Miss Dobson," he stammered, writhing under what he took to be
the lash of her irony. "Give me time to explain. You see me here--"

"Hush," she cried, "man of my greater, my deeper and nobler need!
Oh hush, ideal which not consciously I was out for to-night--ideal
vouchsafed to me by a crowning