As she was leaving she had said, “I shall see you again, of course.”

In spite of its inconsistency he had sensed a certain habitual tenderness in her voice, as if custom were demanding its due.  And, for a moment, the old bond between them touched him with its false warmth.  But a swift revulsion swept him.

“Why bother?” he had thrown back at her.

“You mean you don’t want me to come?”

“Yes, just that!”

He had taken her breath away, perhaps even wounded her, momentarily, but she had recovered herself quickly.  Her smile had been full of the smug satisfaction of one who has washed his hands in public self-justification.

She had left soon after that passage at arms, achieving the grace to dispense with the empty formality of either a kiss or a farewell embrace...  He remembered how he had flung up the window as if to clear the room of her poisonous presence...

To-day, sitting upon his narrow bed, instinctively following the patch of yellow sunlight as it gilded the gloom, he felt that the maniac next door had the better part.  Of what use was reason when it ceased to function except in terms of withering unbelief?

He sat motionless for hours, waiting patiently for them to come and release him to sharper sorrows.  He had a passive eagerness to taste bitterness to the lees...  When he heard the door open finally he did not rise.  He kept his face buried.  A light footstep came nearer and he was conscious of the pressure of icy fingers upon his hands.  He looked up.  Ginger stood before him.

“I brought you some smokes,” she said, simply, “but they wouldn’t let me bring them in.”

He tried to speak, but suddenly great sobs shook him.

She put her fingers in his hair, drawing him to his feet, and presently he felt her own tears splashing his cheek.

He was smiling when they finally came for him.  But he felt weaker than ever, and as they walked out into the glare of the street he was glad to lean upon Ginger’s arm.  The sheriff’s van was drawn up to the curb.  Two deputies helped him in.  He turned for a last look at Ginger.  Her pale little face was twisted, but she waved a gay farewell.  In a far corner of the lumbering machine Fred could see two catlike eyes glimmering.  Slowly his gaze penetrated the gloom, and the figure of a battered man shaped itself, his two hands strapped to his sides.  The deputies got in, the door was shut sharply, and the van shot forward.

In less than fifteen minutes they had reached the ferry.

The train was late, and it was long after nine o’clock when it pulled into the Fairview station.  The day had been hot, and the breath of evening was bringing out grateful and cooling odors from the sunburnt stubble of the hillside as Fred Starratt and his keeper stepped upon the station platform.  The insane Italian followed between two guards.  An automobile swung toward them.  They got in and rode through the thickening gloom for about three miles...  Presently one of the deputies leaned toward Fred, pointing a finger in the direction of a cluster of lights, as he said: