served in the restaurant?" Maraton asked.

The man shook his head.

"Not regular meals, sir," he replied. "What food we've got is all
locked up. You can get something between eight and nine. We close the
hotel doors then."

"They tell me I can select any room I like upstairs that isn't
occupied," Maraton remarked.

The porter nodded.

"Nearly all the servants have gone," he explained, "so they can't try to
run the hotel. Gone out to find food somewhere. They couldn't feed
them here."

"Is there wine in the place?" Selingman asked.

"Plenty," the man answered.

"If needs be, then, we will carouse," Selingman declared. "First, a
wash. Then I will forage. Leave it to me to forage, you others. I
know the tricks. I shall not go away. I shall stay here with you."

They selected rooms--Maraton and Selingman adjoining ones on the first
floor; the others higher up. Then Selingman departed on his expedition,
and Maraton sat down before the window in the sitting-room. He drew
aside the curtain and stared. They had been in the hotel rather less
than half an hour, but the autumn twilight had deepened rapidly.
Darkness had fallen upon the city--a strange, unredeemed darkness. The
street lamps were unlit. It was as though a black hand had been laid
upon the place. Only here and there the sky was reddened as though with
conflagration. Maraton's head sunk upon his arms. These, indeed, were
the days when he would need all his courage. He threw open the window.
There was a curious silence without. The roar of traffic had ceased
entirely. The only sound was the footfall of the people upon the
pavement. He looked down into the street, crowded with little knots of
men, one or two of them carrying torches. He watched them stream by.
It was the breaking up of the crowd which had gathered together to sack
and burn his house.

The door was softly opened and closed again. He turned half around.
Through the shadows he saw Julia's pale face as she came swiftly towards
him. With a sudden gesture she fell on her knees by his side. Her
fingers clasped him, she clung to his arm.

"Ah, I knew that I should find you like this!" she cried. "Don't look
down into the street, don't look at those unlit places! Look up to the
skies. See, there is a star there already. Nothing up there--nothing
which really matters--is altered. This is only the destruction that
must come before the dawn. It was you yourself who prophesied it, you
yourself who s