That was his mate, walking in his garden before him, veiled.  She was his and he was hers.  They were mated as two atoms of hydrogen and one of oxygen, forming a molecule of water.  All these years, her suffering had reacted upon him, kept him from being happy, and made him fight continually to keep her out of his remembrance.  For having kept her out, he was paying, now, with compound interest.

Upon a lofty spire of granite stands a wireless telegraph instrument.  Fogs are thick about it, wild surges crash in the unfathomable depths below; the silence is that of chaos, before the first day of creation.  Out of the emptiness, a world away, comes a message.  At the first syllable, the wireless instrument leaps to answer its mate.  With the universe between them, those two are bound together, inextricably, eternally bound.  One may fancy that a disorder in one might cause vague unrest in the other.  In like manner, Evelina’s obsession had preyed upon Anthony Dexter for twenty-five years.  Now, the line was at work again and there was an unceasing flow of communication.

Perhaps, if he had the strength, he might learn to ignore the phantom as he had ignored memory.  Eventually, he might be able to put aside the eternal presence as he had put aside his own cowardice.  There was indefinite comfort in the thought.

Having preached the gospel of work for so long, he began to apply it to himself.  Work was undoubtedly what he needed—­the one thing which could set him right again.  After a little, he could make the rounds with Ralph, and dwell constantly in the boy’s sunny presence.  In the meantime, there was his paper, for the completion of which one more experiment was absolutely essential.

He stirred uneasily in his chair.  He wished that Ralph had not been so womanish, or else that he had more diplomatically concealed his own opinions, to which, indeed, Ralph had admitted his right.  Condemnation from Ralph was the one thing he could not bear, but, after all, was it needful that Ralph should know?

The experiment would not take long, as he wished to satisfy himself on but one minor point.  It could be done, easily, while Ralph was out upon his daily round.  Behind the lilac bushes there was yet room for one more tiny grave.

One more experiment, and then, in deference to Ralph’s foolish, effeminate sentiments, he would give it up.  One more heart in action, the conclusion of his brilliant paper, and then—­why, he would be willing to devote the rest of his life, in company with Ralph, to curing whooping-cough, measles, and mumps.

The veiled figure still paced restlessly back and forth, now on the turf and now on the brick walk.  He closed his eyes, but he still saw Evelina and noted the slight difference of sound in her footfalls as she crossed the walk.  He heard the swish of her skirts as she lifted them when she passed the pool of water—­was it possible that his hearing was becoming more keen?  He was sure that he had not heard it from that distance before.