one like it. As she held it near him it exhaled an exquisitely
reminiscent perfume--a perfume which seemed to breathe of old joys,
old memories, and loves of long ago.

"Is it not beautiful?" she said. "It is called the _Toinnette_. Take
it, dear, and keep it--for memory." Then, as he took it from her, her
eyes widened in a sudden anguish of dread and comprehension.

"Oh, you're leaving me!" she said. "You're waking. Dearest, dearest,
stay with me!"

The words and the look that accompanied them galvanized him into
sudden action. He sprang to his feet, caught her in his arms, held her
there, crushed her there, kissing her eyes, her hair, her exquisitely
soft mouth.

"I will not leave you!" he raved. "I swear I won't! I defy the devil
that's back of this! I swear--" But she, too, was speaking now, and
her words came to his ears as from a long, long distance, sobbingly,
with a catch in the breath, but distinct.

"Alas!" she cried, "you have ruined everything! You have ruined
everything! You will never see me again. Dearest, dearest--"

He awoke. His heart was thumping to suffocation, and he lay exhausted
on his pillow. It was a dark morning, and a cold rain beat dismally
against the window-panes. Gone were the Dream Woman, the Italian
garden, the song of the nightingale, the perfume of flowers. How
definite that perfume had been! He could smell it yet, all around him.
It was like--what was it like? He became suddenly conscious of an