ed into my blankets, but I could not sleep. The stars were too
bright, the wind too full of words, the sweep of the sky too strong. I
shifted the saddle under my head, and turned and turned, but I could not
rest. I looked up again into the eye of my cold, reproving star.

But now, to my surprise and horror, when I looked into the eye of my
monitor, my own eye would not waver nor admit subjection! I rebelled at
my own conscience. I, John Cowles, had all my life been a strong man. I
had wrestled with any who came, fought with any who asked it, matched
with any man on any terms he named. Conflict was in my blood, and always
I had fought blithely. But never with sweat like this on my forehead!
Never with fear catching at my heart! Never with the agony of
self-reproach assailing me! Now, to-night, I was meeting the strongest
antagonist of all my life, the only one I had ever feared.

It was none other than I myself, that other John Cowles, young man, and
now loose in the vast, free, garden of living.

Yet I fought with myself. I tried to banish her face from my heart--with
all my might, and all my conscience, and all my remaining principles, I
did try. I called up to mind my promises, my duties, my honor. But none
of these would put her face away. I tried to forget the softness of her
voice, the fragrance of her hair, the sweetness of her body once held in
my arms, all the vague charm of woman, the enigma, the sphinx, the
mystery-magnet of the world, the charm that has no analysis, that knows
no formula; but I could not forget. A rage filled me against all the
other men in the world. I have said I would set down the truth. The
truth is that I longed to rise and roar in my throat, challenging all
the other men in the world. In truth it was my wish to stride over
there, just beyond, into the darkness, to take this woman by the
shoulders and tell her what was in my blood and in my heart--even though
I must tell her even in bitterness and self-reproach.

It was not the girl to whom I was pledged and plighted, not she to whom
I was bound in honor--that was not the one with the fragrant hair and
the eyes of night, and the clear-cut face, and the graciously
deep-bosomed figure--that was not the one. It was another, of infinite
variety, one more irresistible with each change, that had set on this
combat between me and my own self.

I beat my fists upon the earth. All that I could say to myself was that
she was sweet, sweet, and