"Carlin has not spoken for more than an hour," Skag heard her tell him.

It seemed long before he answered:

"She has passed too far down into the shadows. She will not speak again."

The words came to Skag as if through limitless space; but the last ones penetrated deep and laid hold.

Margaret went out swiftly and the doctor followed. He looked a very, very old man—with his head bent, like that.

. . . She will not speak again!

The universe was falling into disruption.

It was all white where she lay. Only the heavy masses of her dark hair, spread on the pillows and across one shoulder, showed any colour—shadowed gold, shadowed red.

. . . She will not speak again!

Seven tall men filed into the room before Skag's eyes, and ranged on either side of her. These were her own brothers. Skag felt the vague pang again, of being alien to them.

Roderick Deal, the eldest—the one with the inscrutable blackness of eyes—leaned and kissed the white, white forehead; and a fold of the splendid hair.

One figure had gone down at the lower end of the bed—long arms stretched over her feet—slender dark hands clenching and unclenching. The detail of it cut into Skag, like a spear of keen pain through chaos. Returned away—it was intolerable.

. . . An arm fell about Skag's shoulders.

"Brother?" Roderick Deal's fathomless eyes drew Skag's and held them while he spoke: "We are leaving you to be alone with her—at the last!"

The arm gripped as he added:

"You are to know this—we will not fail you, now!" and he was gone. They were all gone.

Faint tones of the fever bird, ascending, came from far out. Other tones, descending, came from greater distances within. . . . She will not speak again!

Bhanah touched his sleeve.

"My Master!" The man's nearness of spirit, as he spoke, vibrated into Skag and roused him to something different, something clearer. "A mystic from the Vindha mountains has but just reached this place. They are very powerful, having great knowledge. This man is blood-kin to her. Give me permission and I will call him."

Skag looked into Bhanah's eyes, finding the ancient friendship there; then he said only one word:

"Hurry!"

Bhanah leaped away across the lawn and Skag turned to stand by Carlin's side.

The silence seemed absolute now; the whiteness absolute. He remembered that she had gone down into shadows. He bent his head toward her breast and looked down.

. . . Sense of time was gone—even the endlessness of it. Sense of whiteness was gone. His vision wakened, as he groped through deepening shadows, on and on—till they turned to utter blackness. In that utter blackness appeared a thread of pure blue; he traced it back up till it entered Carlin's body. There, it was not blue any more, but a faint glow of high white light centred in her breast and shed—like moonlight—through all her person.

The heart of his heart called to her. . . . There was no answer.

. . . He became aware that a tall slender man stood at his side; but it did not disturb him. The man wore long straight robes of camel's hair. The sense of him was strength. At last he spoke:

"Son, why do you call to her? She cannot come back—of herself. You cannot fetch her back."

"Why?" breathed Skag. "I ought to be able to."

"No," the man said kindly, "you are not able to—I am not able to—no created being is able to."

The man emphasised the word created.

"What can?" Skag asked.

"First you must learn not to depend on yourself; then you must know something of the law."

The man was holding one hand out, above Carlin's head—quite still, but not close, while he spoke. Skag felt his strength more than at first.

"Do you want her for yourself?" he asked.

Skag looked into his kind dark eyes—his own eyes speaking for him.

"Do you want her for her own sake—because she loves you? Is it that you have knowledge what will be best for her? Did you create her—did you prepare her ultimate destiny, do you even know it?"

"I know that I am in it!"

Skag answered very low, but with conviction. His eyes were agonised; but the man bored into them, without relenting.

"Do you want her to come back from the margin of departure, for the sake of others—for the sake of her ministry to their need?"

The answer to this last question came up in Skag—waves on waves, rolling into engulfing billows.

"That answer may avail!" the man said conclusively. "If it is accepted—if your love for her is perfect enough to forget itself—if you are able to make your mind altogether inactive—"

"Then how shall I work—if not with my mind?" Skag interrupted.

"First know that you yourself can do nothing." The man spoke with soft, slow emphasis. "No created being has power to do that kind of work."

"What has?" Skag asked.

"A Power that we are not worthy to name," the man answered, with reverence. "If it accepts your reason why she should stay—if your love is found to be without tarnish of self—it will work her restoration; not otherwise.

"Make yourself still. Give your mind to the apprehension of her nature—till your mind has come to be as if it were not. . . . Peace!"

The man dropped his head a moment, before he moved to stand at the food of her bed. With his eyes on her face he leaned, laying his palms over her feet; then, seeming to float backward to the wall, he sank slowly—to sit as the Hindus do.

The sense of his strength seemed to fill the whole room. It was the last outward thing Skag was aware of.

. . . It was as if Skag had passed through eons of ages trying to put away all the tender yearning anguish of his love for Carlin. He came to know her as a beneficent entity of high voltage—needed in more than one place.

It must be that he should make it possible for her to serve here, more potently than there—else she could not be held back. With all his strength, he would try.

"Son," the mystic's voice rang out, "now give yourself to your love for her—with your strength!"

Presently a warm glow flowed up into Skag's feet, filling his person and extending his physical sentiency into her body. That body was utterly bound in a strange vise—very heavy; as if every particle of every part were separately frozen.

. . . It seemed to Skag as if he could not breathe.

"Breathe!" the mystic said, as he rose from the floor to stand on his own feet.

That instant an impact of force from him struck Skag like a blow; and the next moment his sense of strength had become like that of twenty men—it was hard to bear.

"Steady—slow!" It was a soft, but imperative order.

Gradually the warmth increased; not in degree, but in the rate of its flow. At last it was a surge, so intense that Skag could feel his own blood-pulse—a different kind of pulse.

The need of help was very great. There was a faintness—surely more terrible than any death!

"Fear not!" the mystic called tenderly. "The Supreme Power cares for her—more than you can!"

As he heard these words, a great tide rose up into Skag, penetrating his body and his mind and the uttermost deeps of his consciousness. A vast sweeping tide—it descended below all depths, it ascended above all heights, it compassed all reaches. It was ineffable love—transcendent. It was for her! But it was for him—too! Nay—it was for every living thing in this mortal condition and in all other conditions!

. . . Carlin turned her head a little, lifted one hand a little and sighed deeply. Then she moved till she lay easily on one side, just murmuring:

"I think I'll sleep."

Carlin had spoken again!

"Son" (the mystic spoke very softly, while he drew Skag to a large couch in the same room), "it is finished. She is altogether safe now. You should be this far away; stretch yourself here and give yourself to sleep also—it will be best for her if you do.

"Be at perfect rest—there is no fear. (I will give Bhanah directions.) Now—Peace be on thee; and on thy house, forever!"

His words permitted no answer. He went and smiled down on Carlin. He touched her forehead with his finger-tips—he even kissed her curling hair.

"Child of my brother's love!" he said softly, as he turned away.

Then Skag also slept.

THE END