t that he might see Barbara, and yet
must not see her, shut out all the rest.

There had been, it seemed, only one honorable course open when he had
decided to sacrifice his place in life to save Barbara from scandal and
to let her keep her happiness. It was very different now. Her marriage
with Trevor d'Arcy had not been a marriage of love. It had been worse
than a failure. She had loved only one man, John Denin. Why not let her
come and find him?

But no, the trial would be too great. It would not be fair to put the
girl, still almost a child, to such a test. Her love for Denin had been
a delicate poem. He had died, and his memory was cherished in her
heart, as a rose of romance. There was no human passion in such a
gentle love, and only the strongest passion could pass through the
ordeal he proposed. She might hate him for his long silence, and blame
him for deceit. She would see herself disgraced in the eyes of the
world, and nothing that he could give would repay her for all that she
must lose. No love could be expected to stand such a test, much less
the love of a child for an ideal which had never, in truth, existed. It
would break her heart to fail, and break his to have her fail. The
memory of a meeting and a parting would be for him a second
death--death by torture. The temptation to let things take their course
was overcome. Indeed, he no longer felt it as a temptation;
nevertheless he suffered.

Some reason for putting her off must be alleged, but there was time to
think of that afterwards, between the telegram and letter which would
follow. The great thing was to prevent her from coming to the Mirador,
and finding out what a tragic tangle she had made of her life.

When he had sent the cable, and was at home again, Denin read once more
all of Barbara's closely written pages. At the end he kissed the dear
name with a kiss of mingled passion and renunciation.

"She'll think I have no more heart than a stone," he said to himself.
"Her friendship for Sanbourne will crumble to pieces." Ineffably he
longed to keep it--all that he had in life of sunshine. Yet he could
not see how to account for his refusal without lying, and without
appearing in her eyes cold as a block of marble. He looked at the
letter--which might be her last--as a man might look at a beloved face
about to be hidden in a coffin: and suddenly the date sprang to his
eyes.

For all his reading and re-reading he had not noticed it before. Th