colors fairer, or the lady who gave them more lovely than you, I shall
kill him."

She laughed softly and moved away.

"Of course," she said, "of course, you must kill him." She stepped a
few feet from me, and, raising her hands to her throat, unfastened a
little gold chain which she wore around her neck. She took it off and
held it toward me. "Would you like this?" she said. I did not answer,
nor did she wait for me to do so, but wound the chain around my wrist
and fastened it, and I raised it and kissed it, and neither of us
spoke. She went out to the veranda to warn her mother of my departure,
and I to tell the servants to bring the carriage to the door.

A few minutes later, the suburban train drew out of the station at
Dobbs Ferry, and I waved my hand to Beatrice as she sat in the
carriage looking after me. The night was warm and she wore a white
dress and her head was uncovered. In the smoky glare of the station
lamps I could still see the soft tints of her hair; and as the train
bumped itself together and pulled forward, I felt a sudden panic of
doubt, a piercing stab at my heart, and something called on me to leap
off the car that was bearing me away, and go back to the white figure
sitting motionless in the carriage. As I gripped the iron railing to
restrain myself, I felt the cold sweat springing to the palm of my
hand. For a moment I forgot the end of my long journey. I saw it as
something foolish, mad, fantastic. I was snatching at a flash of
powder, when I could warm my hands at an open fire. I was deserting
the one thing which counted and of which I was certain; the one thing
I loved. And then the train turned a curve, the lamps of the station
and the white ghostly figure were shut from me, and I entered the