'Tis the sun and the moon of my days;
And the doors of its glory are ever ajar,
And I live in the glow of its rays.
'Tis my winter of joy and my summer of rest,
'Tis my future, my present, my past;
And though storms fill the East and the clouds haunt the West,
I shall follow my Star to the last."

"There, that was to Lucile. What would he write to Gabrielle--to Henri's
Gabrielle? How droll--how droll!" Again she laughed that laugh of
eternal recklessness.

It filled Shorland this time with a sense of fear. He lost sight of
everything--this strange and interesting woman, and the peculiar nature
of the events in which he was sharing, and saw only Clare Hazard's ruined
life, Luke Freeman's despair, and the fatal 26th of January, so near at
hand. He could see no way out of the labyrinth of disgrace. It unnerved
him more than anything that had ever happened to him, and he turned
bewildered towards the door. He saw that while Gabrielle lived, a dead
misfortune would be ever crouching at the threshold of Freeman's home,
that whether the woman agreed to be silent or not, the hurt to Clare
would remain the same. With an angry bitterness in his voice that he
did not try to hide he said: "There is nothing more to be done now,
Gabrielle, that I can see. But it is a crime--it is a pity!"

"A pity that he did not tell the truth on the gravestone--that he did not
follow his star to the last, monsieur? How droll! And you should see
how green the grass was on my grave! Yes, it is a pity."

But Shorland, heavy at heart, looked at her and said nothing more. He