She had belonged to another man; she might belong to him even now.

She had come to find if he was alive--or dead.
And if alive?
Aldous stopped again, and looked down into the dark pit through which the river was rushing a hundred feet below him.

It tore in frothing maelstroms through a thousand rocks, filling the night with a low thunder.

To John Aldous the sound of it might have been a thousand miles away.

He did not hear.