It came to him calmly, without surprise or shock, this stupid certainty of himself.  And at the same moment the crisis was passing, leaving him stunned, impassive, half senseless as the resurgent passion battered at his will power, to wreck and undo it—­deafening, imperative, wave on wave, in vain.

The thing to do was to hold on.  One of them was adrift; the other dared not let go; he seemed to realise it, somehow.  Odd bits of phrases, old-fashioned sayings, maxims long obsolete came to him without reason or sequence—­“Greater love hath no man—­no man—­no man—­” and “As ye do unto the least of these “—­odd bits of phrases, old-fashioned sayings, maxims, alas! long obsolete, long buried with the wisdom of the dead.

He held her still locked in his arms.  From time to time, unconsciously, as her hot grief spent itself, he bent his head, laying his face against hers, while his haggard, perplexed gaze wandered about the room.

In the dimness the snowy bed loomed beside them; pink roses patterned curtain and wall; the tiny night-light threw a roseate glow across her gown.  In the fresh, sweet stillness of the room there was no sound or stir save their uneven breathing.

Very gently he lifted one of her hands and looked at it almost curiously—­this small white hand so innocently smooth—­as unblemished as a child’s—­this unsullied little hand that for an instant seemed to be slowly relaxing its grasp on the white simplicity around her—­here in this dim, fresh, fragrant world of hers, called, intimately, her room.

And here where night and morning had so long held sacred all that he cared for upon earth—­here in the white symbol of the world—­her room—­he gave himself again to her, without a word, without hope, knowing the end of all was near for them.

But it was she, not he, who must make the sign that ended all.  And, after a long, long time, as she made no sign: 

“Dearest,” he breathed, “I know now that you will never go with me—­for your father’s sake.”

That was premature, for she only clung the closer.  He waited cautiously, every instinct alert, his head close to hers.  And at last the hot fragrance of her tears announced the beginning of the end.

“Shiela?”

A stifled sound from his shoulder where her head lay buried.

“Choose now,” he said.

No answer.

“Choose.”

She cowered in his arms.  He looked at the little hand once more, no longer limp but clenched against his breast.  And he knew that the end was close at hand, and he spoke again, forcing her to her victory.

“Dearest, you must choose—­”

“Garry!”

“Between those others—­and me—­”

She shrank out of his arms, turned with a sob, swayed, and sank on her knees beside the bed, burying her head in her crossed arms.

This was her answer; and with it he went away into the darkness, reeling, groping, while every pulse in him hammered ironic salutation to the victor who had loved too well to win.  And in his whirling brain sounded the mocking repetition of his own words:  “Nothing is lost through love!  Nothing is lost—­nothing—­nothing!”—­flouting, taunting him who had lost love itself there on the firing line, for a comrade’s sake.