you cooped up in such a place upon a winter's day. Enthusiasm
makes one forget everything."

"At least without it we should do nothing; besides, please do not pity
me, for I have never been happier in my life."

"I am most grateful," he said earnestly. "I don't know what I should
have done without you through this critical time, or what I shall----"
and he stopped.

"It went beautifully to-day, didn't it?" she broke in, as though she had
not heard his words.

"Yes," he answered, "beyond all expectations. We must experiment over a
greater distance, and then if the thing still works I shall be able to
speak with my critics in the gate. You know I have kept everything as
dark as possible up to the present, for it is foolish to talk first and
fail afterwards. I prefer to succeed first and talk afterwards."

"What a triumph it will be!" said Stella. "All those clever scientists
will arrive prepared to mock, then think they are taken in, and at last
go away astonished to write columns upon columns in the papers."

"And after that?" queried Morris.

"Oh, after that, honour and glory and wealth and power and--the happy
ending. Doesn't it sound nice?"

"Ye--es, in a way. But," he added with energy, "it won't come off. No,
not the aerophones, they are right enough I believe, but all the rest of
it."

"Why not?"

"Because it is too much. 'Happy endings' don't come off. The happiness
lies in the struggle, you know,--an old saying, but quite true.
Afterwards something intervenes."

"To have struggled happily and successfully is happiness in itself.
Whatever comes afterwards nothing can take that away. 'I have done
something; it is good; it cannot be changed; it is a stone built for
ever in the pyramid of beauty, or knowledge, or advancement.' What can
man hope to say more at the last, and how few live to say it, to say it
truly? You will leave a great name behind you, Mr. Monk."

"I shall leave my work; that is enough for me," he answered.

For a while they walked in silence; then some thought struck him, and he
stopped to ask:

"Why did Layard come to the Dead Church to-day? He said that he was
going home, and it isn't on his road."

Stella turned her head, but, even in that faint light, not quickly
enough to prevent him seeing a sudden flush change the pallor of her
face to the rich colour of her lips.

"To call, I suppose; or," correcting herself, "perhaps from curiosity."

"And what did he talk about?"