and turned away he was sure she knew that he had taken the the touch of review and he felt that he was beginning to hate her again i haven t time for such things he said indifferently as he moved to the door he heard her take a hurried step forward then she paused and sank without speaking into the chair from which he had risen a vanished hand xi as in the raw february sunlight mounted the road to the he felt the that comes with an abrupt of physical pain he had reached the point where self analysis ceases the impulse that moved him was purely he did not even seek a reason for it beyond the obvious one that his desire to stand by margaret s grave was prompted by no attempt at a sentimental but rather by the need to affirm in some way the reality of the tie between them the of death had brought mrs back to share the hospitality of her husband s last lodging but though knew she had been buried near new york he had never the touch of visited her grave he was oppressed lis he now the long avenues l y a vision of her return there was no family to follow her she had died alone as she had lived and the distinguished who had formed the escort of the famous writer knew nothing of the woman they were committing to the grave could not even remember at what season she had been buried but his mood indulged the fancy that it must have been on some such day of harsh sunlight the february brightness that gives without warmth the white avenues stretched before him lined with of affliction as though all the ever uttered had been turned to marble and set up over the dead here and there no doubt a urn or an angel imprisoned some grief as the most words may become the vehicle of rare a vanished hand l ut for the most part the endless of monuments seemed to those easy about death that do not disturb the repose of the living s eye as he followed the way pointed out to him had instinctively sought some low mound with a quiet he had forgotten that the dead seldom plan their own houses and with a pang he discovered the name he sought on the base of a shaft its height at the angle of two avenues how she would have hated it i he murmured a bench stood near and he seated himself the monument rose before him like some dwelling he could not believe that margaret lay there it was a sunday morning and black figures moved along the paths placing flowers on the frost bound noticed that the neighbouring graves had been the touch of thus newly dressed and he fancied a blind stir of through the sod as though the bare spread a surface to that rain he rose presently and walked back to the entrance of the several stood near the gates and turning in at the first he asked for some flowers in the line asked the man behind the counter shook his head just cut flowers this way then the unlocked a glass door and led him down a moist green aisle the hot air was choked with the scent of white white lilies white all the flowers were white they were like a a mystic of the long rows of marble and their perfume seemed to cover an of decay the rich atmosphere made dizzy as he leaned in a vanished hand the doorway waiting for the flowers he had a penetrating sense of margaret s � not the presence of his inner vision but a hfe that beat warm in his arms the sharp air caught him as he stepped out into it again he walked back and scattered the flowers over the grave the edges of the white like burnt paper in the cold and as he watched them the illusion of her faded shrank back frozen the touch of xii the motive of his visit to the remained save as a final effort of escape from his wife s acceptance of his shame it seemed to him that as long as he could keep himself alive to that shame he would not wholly have to its consequences his chief fear was that he should become the creature of his act his wife s indifference degraded him it seemed to put him on a level with his margaret would have the deed in proportion to her pity for the man the sense of her pity drew him back to her the one woman knew but did not understand the other it sometimes seemed understood without knowing a vanished hand � in its last disguise of remorse his self pity a desire for solitude and meditation he lost himself in morbid in visions of what life with margaret might have been there were moments when in the strange of his view the wrong he had done her seemed a tie between them to indulge these emotions he fell into the habit on sunday of solitary walks prolonged till after dusk the days were there was a touch of spring in the air and his wanderings now usually led him to the park and its regions sunday tired of he took a cab at the park gates and let it carry him out to the drive it was a grey afternoon with east wind s cab advanced slowly and as he leaned back gazing with absent at the deserted paths that wound under bare boughs the touch of between grass banks of premature ness his attention was arrested by two figures walking ahead of him this couple who had the path to themselves moved at an pace as though their gait to a conversation marked by meditative intervals now and then they paused and 