Was it, then, unacceptable?
Was it so that he must turn his back upon this long, heart-breaking but beloved work, this panacea for his soul, without which he could not pay the price of blood?
Go back to England--to Hamley where all had changed, where the old man he loved no longer ruled in the Red Mansion, where all that had been could be no more?
Go to some other land, and there begin again another such a work?
Were there not vast fields of human effort, effort such as his, where he could ease the sorrow of living by the joy of a divine altruism?
Go back to Hamley?
Ah, no, a million times, no! That life was dead, it was a cycle of years behind him.

There could be no return.
He was in a maelstrom of agony, his veins were afire, his lips were parched.

He sprang from his bed, knelt down, and felt for the little phial he had flung aside.

After a moment his hand caught it, clutched it.

But, even at the crest of the wave of temptation, words that he had heard one night in Hamley, that last night of all, flashed into his mind--the words of old Luke Claridge's prayer, "And if a viper fasten on his hand, O Lord--" Suddenly he paused.