wet with them. Nevertheless he smiled, and said:

"Well, it can't be helped. If I'd known when I started that it
would end like this--I'd have gone through with it just the same. I
haven't got cold feet."

Sec.2

"It's an end to all the ambitions and poems," said Doe later, when
the windowless tent seemed to be getting dark, though the afternoon
was yet early. "P'raps you'll be left to fulfil yours, Rupert. Do
you remember you said in Radley's room--all those hundreds of years
ago--that you wanted to be a country squire?"

"Yes," answered I, with a quivering lip.

"And Penny wanted--to be a Tory.... And I wanted to lead the people.
Oh, well. I'd like just to have known--whether we won the war in the
end. P'raps you'll know--"

"We're winning," said I feebly.

"O Lord, yes," agreed Doe, dreamily echoing an old memory.

It grew darker, though not yet three o'clock; and my brain seemed to
be receding from me with the light. I felt tired and frightened.
There was a long pause, till at last I said:

"Well, I s'pose I must be going now."

God! The futility of the words! And they were the last I could utter
to Doe!... I grasped his wrist. If I couldn't speak, I could pass
all my abounding love and misery through the pressure of my hand.

"Good-bye," he said. "Thanks for coming to see me."

The boyish words broke me up. My brows contracted in pain. My eyes
burned, and misery filled my throat. I even felt a smile at the
tragedy of it all pass over my face. Then with an audible moan I
rushed away.

I went out to my horse without waiting for Monty. I could have
waited for nobody. I wanted motion, action, something to occupy my
hands and feet and mind. As I mounted the mare she began to walk
away. But walking was not action enough. Impatiently I urged her to
a canter and a gallop. And, while she galloped, increasing her
distance from the "White City," I asked myself if I realised that I
was riding away from Doe for ever.

The spirited mare, knowing that she was going home to her lines,
opened out like a winner racing up the straight. The extravagance of
her speed exactly fitted my extravagant mood. I promised myself
that, just as I was letting my animal have its head, so I would
slacken all moral reins, and let my life run uncontrolled. There was
_not_ more beauty in things than ugliness, nor more happiness in
life than pain. Have done with this straining after ideals!... The
horse gathered pace.

Then, as I