What happened thereafter he never rightly knew, only that in a distempered dream he was standing with others outside the rails about Government House while the snow began to fall through the darkness, that he saw the dancers circling across the lighted windows and heard the music of the flutes and violins above the steady chime of the sea, that he knew this merry-making to be a festival of her marriage whom he loved with a love beyond that of his immortal soul, that the shame of his condition pained him, and the pain of it maddened him, the madness of it swept away his consciousness, and that when he came to himself he had forced his way into the house, thinking to meet his enemy face to face, and was in a room alone with Greeba, who was cowering before him with a white face of dismay.
"Jason," she was saying, "why are you here?"
"Why are you here?" he asked.
"Why have you followed me?" she cried.
"Why have you followed him?"
"What have you come for?"
"Is this what you have come for?"
"Jason," she cried again, "I wronged you, that is true, but you forgave me. I asked you to choose for me, and if you had said 'stay,' I should have stayed. But you released me, you know you did. You gave me up to him, and now he is my husband."
"But this man is Michael Sunlocks," said Jason.
"Didn't you know that before?" said Greeba. "Ah, then, I know what you have come for. You have recalled your forgiveness, and have come to punish me for deserting you. But spare me! Oh, spare me! Not for my own sake, but his; for I am his wife now and he loves me very dearly. No, no, not that, but only spare me, Jason," she cried, and crouched at his feet.