pon my face, she added, "I
daresay this is nothing. It will go off. I think it is only hysterical.
Don't look so unhappy!" And a faint smile swept over her pallid face.

She made her way to the sideboard and drank some water standing there.
Then she continued to move slowly round the room, both hands pressed
beneath her left breast, and her delicate eyebrows contracted into one
dark line across her colourless face.

"I overworked myself so tremendously just lately," she said, after a
minute, "after--well, after I came to you in Paris. I shall take a long
rest now. I hope I shall get strong again. When one is as delicate as
this, life is not worth having."

And then, before I could answer, she stopped suddenly, and looked
across the room at me with dilated eyes.

"Is there any brandy I could have?" she asked, abruptly.

My handbag stood in the corner of the room. There was a flask of brandy
there. In two seconds I had got it out and was beside her with the
traveling-glass half filled.

She took it with a fluttering, uncertain hand, and drank a little, but
not even then did the colour come back to her lips--they were apart and
grey. She set the glass down on the table with a wandering, undecided
movement, and then turned towards me and linked two ice-cold hands
round my neck,--

"Hold me up! I am sinking!" and her head fell heavily against my
shoulder.

I clasped my arm firmly round her waist. I was startled, distressed,
alarmed, but still, even then, I did not think there was any serious
danger. I thought she was hysterical, as she had said; over-strained,
and over-excited. I thought at most this was a fainting attack. I
thought--God knows what I thought. I must have been blind.

She put her hand to her throat, and I saw she wanted air. Supporting
her, I crossed to the window, and stood where the cool night breeze
came blowing in upon her face. My hand followed hers to her bodice, and
I loosened all the delicate lace ruffles round it that it had never
been my privilege to touch till now, and that were no whiter than the
lovely breast from which I unloosed them.

So we stood for a few seconds, her lids were drooped over her eyes. At
intervals, it seemed to me, her heart gave great single, convulsive
throbs that thudded through both our beings.

Then suddenly she tore her eyes wide open, and fixed them in an
unreasoning agony upon me. A straining, fearful effort seemed in them.
I pressed her to me.

"What i