The thought of Her came in again and again, but the thought couldn't help him. Her face drove the last of his curses from his lips, but it threw him into a fathomless despair, where he no longer defined his thoughts into words. Her face shone like a star, but it stood over a bottomless rift in the earth and showed how impassable its yawning barrier was.
There came a whoop outside and a scramble at the door and somebody tumbled into the room.
"Anybody here?"
"Hello, where are you, Brad?"
He recognized Milton's voice. "Yes, I'm here; but wait a minute."
"Cæsar, I guess we'll wait! Break our necks if we don't," said the other shadow whom he now recognized as Shep Watson. "Always live in the dark?"
They waited while he lighted the dim little kerosene lamp on the table. "O conspiracy, shamest thou to show thy dangerous brow by night," quoted Shep in the interim.
"Been 'sleep?" asked Milton.
"No. Se' down, anywheres," he added on second thought, as he realized that chairs were limited.
"Say, Brad, come on; let's go over t' the society."