an she is at this. She
has not changed since, nor has the thing which I have just discovered;
it is only I who am different because it is I alone who have come into
knowledge of the evil."

He thought of the hideousness of it all--of the punishment that awaited
her, of her convulsed face, of her violent gestures, and even of the
pale pink chiffon gown, which made her resemble a crushed blossom as she
lay upon the bed. That was only last night, and yet in the reality of
experience a thousand years had intervened in his soul since then.

The next instant he remembered again, with a throb of exhilaration that
he was free. By her own act she had given him back his freedom--she had
returned him to his life and to his work. As for her if she chose to
fall back into her old bondage, who was there in heaven or on earth that
could hold him to account? Every law that had been made by man since the
beginning of law was upon his side; and every law declared to him that
he was free. Free! The word went like the intoxication of joy to his
head; then, even while the exhilaration lasted, he shivered and came
abruptly to a halt.

From the light of the crossing a woman had come close to him and touched
him upon the arm, making her immemorial appeal with a sickening coquetry
in her terrible eyes. She was, doubtless, but the ordinary creature of
her class, yet coming as she did upon the brief rapture of his recovered
liberty, she appeared as a visible answer to the question he had asked
his soul. He shook his head and walked on a few steps; then coming back
again he gave her the money that was in his pocket.

"Is this the message?" he put to himself as he turned away. "Is this
the message, or is it only the ugly hallucination of my nerves?" With an
effort he sought to shake the image from him, but in spite of his closed
mind it still seemed to him that he saw Connie's future looking back at
him from the woman's terrible eyes. "And yet what have I to do with that
woman or she with Connie?" he demanded. "I have so far as I am aware
never injured either in my life, nor by any act of mine have I helped to
make my wife what she is to-day--one with that creature in the street
and with her kind. The law acquits me. Religion acquits me. My own
conscience acquits me more than all." But the argument was vain and
empty so long as he saw Connie's future revealed to him through the eyes
of the harlot he had left at the crossing. The helplessness of