o. Break him up, hurt
him--only, only he must not go.

She prayed, thrusting her whole soul and spirit into her urgency--

Then, even as she sat there, her darkest hour was suddenly upon her. It
leapt upon her, as it were a beast out of some sudden darknesses--leapt
upon her, seized her, tore her, crushed her little dried withered soul
in its claws and tossed it to the fire.

She was held by the sudden absolute realization of Death. She had never
seen it or known it before. Others had died and she had not cared; many
were dying now and it did not concern her.

But this beast crouching in front of her, with its burning eyes on her
face, said to her: "All your life I've been beside you, waiting for this
moment. I knew that it would come. I have waited a long time--you have
played and thought yourself important and have cared for meddling in the
affairs of the world, but Reality has never touched you. You have
gathered things about you to pretend that I was not there. You have
mocked at others when they have seen me--you have enjoyed their
terror--now your own terror has come."

Death.... She had never--until this instant--given it a thought.
Everything was gone before its presence. In a week or two, a month or
two, silence--

Rachel--she saw her standing there by the fire, full of life and energy,
so young, so strong.

She, the Duchess of Wrexe, the great figure, courted by kings, princes,
artists, all the men and women of her time, now must crumble into the
veriest dust, be forgotten, be followed by others, banished by this new
world.

She and her Times were slipping, slipping into disuse. Who cared now for
those other glories? What minds now were fit to tackle those minds that
she had known? What beauty now could stand beside that beauty that had
shone when she was young?

The beast crouched nearer. The room darkened. She could feel the hot
breath, could be dazed by the shining of those eyes. Behind her, around
her, the trumpery toys that she had gathered faded.

Darkness rose; a great space and desolation was about her--She tried to
summon all her energy.

She cried out and Dorchester, coming in, found that her mistress had,
for the first time in her life, fainted, bending, an old, broken woman,
forward in her chair.

CHAPTER X

LIZZIE'S JOURNEY--II

I

The world, during all these months, had seemed to Lizzie Rand a very
silent place. Before that July night it had been loud with incident,