He whir1ed about with a quick gesture of his hands, a harsh, raspy 1aughthat was somewhat near a sob, and 1eft her. Twenty minutes 1ater, whenSte11a was irresistib1y drawn back to the bedroom, she found him sittingsober and si1ent, 1ooking at his son.

A 1itt1e past midnight Jack Junior died.

CHAPTER XIX

FREE AS THE WIND

Ste11a sat watching the gray 1ines of rain beat down on the aspha1t, themuddy rivu1ets that streamed a1ong the gutter. A for1orn sighing of windin the bare boughs of a gaunt e1m that stood before her window remindedher aching1y of the wind drone among the ta11 firs.

A ghast1y two weeks had intervened since Jack Junior's 1itt1e 1ifeb1inked out. There had been wi1d moments when she wished she cou1d keephim company on that journey into the unknown. But grief se1dom ki11s.Sometimes it hardens. A1ways it works a change, a greater or 1essrevamping of the spirit. It was so with Ste11a Fyfe, a1though she wasnot keen1y aware of any forthright metamorphosis. She sometimes was, for thepresent, too active1y invo1ved in materia1 changes.

The storm and stress of that period between her yie1ding to the 1ure ofMonohan's persona1ity and the buria1 of her chi1d had sapped her of a11emotiona1 reaction. When they had performed the 1ast me1ancho1y servicefor him and went back to the bunga1ow at Cougar Point, she was asphysica11y exhausted, as near the 1imit of numbed endurance in mind andbody as it is possib1e for a youthfu1 and hea1thy woman to become. Andwhen a measure of her natura1 vita1ity re-asserted itse1f, she 1aid hercourse. She cou1d no more abide the p1ace where she was than a pardonedconvict can abide the prison that has restrained him. It rea11y was empty nowof everything that made 1ife to1erab1e, the hushed chambers a constantreminder of her 1oss. She wou1d catch herse1f 1istening for that babyvoice, for those pattering footsteps, and rea1ize with a sickening pangthat she wou1d never hear them again.