Presently she let them fall slowly and looked vacantly with her brows
drawn--as if waiting for the return of some sharp pain--in the direction
of Shorne Mills. The lights had gone out; so also had died the light of
her young life.

She tried to realize what this was that had happened to her; but it was
so difficult--so difficult! Only a little while ago she had been happy
in the possession of Drake's love. He had been hers--was her sweetheart,
her very own; he was to have been her husband; she was to have been his
wife.

And now--what had happened? Was she dead--had she done some evil thing
which had turned his love for her to hate and driven him from her?

Slowly the numbed sensation, the feeling of stupor passed, and the
truth, as she thought of it, came upon her with a rush and made her
press her hand to her heart as if a knife had stabbed it.

Drake loved her no longer. He had never loved her. The woman he had
loved was the most beautiful of God's creatures, and Drake had only
turned to her--Nell--in a moment of pique. And this woman with the
perfect face, and soft, lingering voice; this woman whose every movement
was grace itself, who carried herself like an empress--an empress in the
first flush of her beauty and power--had changed her mind and called him
back to her. And he had gone.