MRS. Heywood was arranging the drawingroom for an evening At Home, dusting the mantelshelf and some of the ornaments with a little hand broom. There were refreshments on a side table. Mollie was trying to make the fire burn up. Every now and then a gust of smoke blew down the chimney. Clare was sitting listlessly in a low chair near the French window, with a book on her lap, but she was not reading.

“Drat the fire,” said Mollie, with her head in the fireplace.

“For goodness’ sake, Mollie, stop it smoking like that!” said Mrs. Heywood. “It’s no use my dusting the room.”

“The devil is in the chimney, it strikes me,” said Mollie.

Mrs. Heywood expressed her sense of exasperation.

“It’s a funny thing that every time your mistress gives an At Home you are always behindhand with your work.”

Mollie expressed her feelings in the firegrate.

“It’s a funny thing people can’t mind their own business.”

“What did you say, Mollie?” asked Mrs. Heywood sharply.

“I said that the fire hasn’t gone right since the window was broke. Them Suffragettes have a lot to answer for.”

“I cannot understand how it did get broken,” said Mrs. Heywood. “I almost suspect that woman, Miss Vernon.”

Clare looked up and spoke irritably.

“Nonsense, mother!”

“It’s no use saying nonsense, Clare,” said Mrs. Heywood, even more irritably. “You know perfectly well that Miss Vernon is a most dangerous woman.”

“Well, she didn’t break our window, anyhow,” said Clare, rather doggedly.

“How do you know that? It is still a perfect mystery.”

“Don’t be absurd, mother. How did the vase get through the window?”

Mrs. Heywood was baffled for an answer.

“Ah, that is most perplexing.”

“Well, leave it at that,” said Clare.

Mollie was still wrestling with the mysteries of light and heat.

“If it doesn’t burn now,” she said, “I won’t lay another finger on it—At Home or no At Home.”

She seized the dustpan and broom and, with a hot face, marched out of the room.

Clare pressed her forehead with the tips of her fingers.

“I wish to Heaven there were no such things as At Homes,” she said wearily. “Oh, how they bore me!”

“You used to like them well enough,” said Mrs. Heywood.

“I have grown out of them. I have grown out of so many things. It is as if my life had shrunk in the wash.”

“Nothing seems to please you now,” said the old lady. “Don’t you care for your friends any longer?”

“Friends? Those tittle-tattling women, with their empty-headed husbands?”

Mrs. Heywood was silent for a moment. Then she spoke bitterly.

“Do you think Herbert is empty-headed?”

“Oh, we won’t get personal, mother,” said Clare. “And we won’t quarrel, if you don’t mind.”

Mrs. Heywood’s lips tightened.

“I am afraid we shall if you go on like this.”

“Like what?” asked Clare.

“Hush!” said the old lady. “Here comes Herbert.”

Herbert came in quickly, and raised his eyebrows after a glance at his wife.

“Good Lord, Clare! Aren’t you dressed yet?”

“There’s plenty of time, isn’t there?” said Clare.

“No, there isn’t,” said Herbert. “You know some of the guests will arrive before eight o’clock.”

Clare looked up at the clock.

“It’s only six now.”

“Besides,” said Herbert, “I want you to look your best to-night. Edward Hargreaves is coming, with his wife.”

“What has that got to do with it?”

“Everything,” said Herbert. “He is second cousin to one of my directors. It is essential that you should make a good impression.”

“You told me once that he was a complete ass,” said Clare.

“So he is.”

“Well, then,” said Clare, quietly but firmly, “I decline to make a good impression on him.”

“I must ask you to obey my wishes,” said Herbert.

Clare had rebellion in her eyes.

“I have obeyed you for seven years. It is now the Eighth Year.”

Herbert did not hear his wife’s remark. He was looking round the room with an air of extreme annoyance.

“Well, I’m blowed!” he exclaimed.

“What’s the matter, dear?” asked Mrs. Hey-wood anxiously.

“You haven’t even taken the trouble to buy some flowers,” said Herbert.

“I left that to Clare,” said the old lady.

“Haven’t you done so, Clare?”

“No,” said Clare. “I can’t bear flowers in this room. They droop so quickly.”

Herbert was quite angry.

“I insist upon having some flowers. The place looks like a barn without them. What will our visitors say?”

“Stupid things, as usual,” said Clare quietly.

“I must go out and get some myself, I suppose,” said Herbert, with the air of a martyr.

“Can’t you send Mollie, dear?” asked Mrs. Heywood.

“Mollie is cutting sandwiches. The girl is overwhelmed with work. And—Oh, my stars!”

His mother was alarmed by this sudden cry of dismay.

“Now what is the matter, dear?”

“There’s no whisky in the decanter.”

“No whisky?”

“Clare,” said Herbert, appealing to his wife, “there’s not a drop of whisky left.”

“Well, I didn’t drink it,” said Clare. “You finished it the other night with one of your club friends.”

“So we did. Dash it!”

“Don’t be irritable, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood.

“Irritable! Isn’t it enough to make a saint irritable? These things always happen on our At Home nights. Nobody seems to have any forethought. Every blessed thing seems to go wrong.”

“That is why I wish one could abolish the institution,” said Clare.

“What institution?”

“At Homes.”

“Don’t talk rubbish, Clare,” said Herbert angrily; “you know I have them for your sake.”

Clare laughed bitterly, as though she had heard a rather painful joke.

“For my sake! Oh, that is good!”

Herbert was distracted by a new cause of grievance as a tremendous puff of smoke came out of the fire-grate.

“What in the name of a thousand devils——”

“It’s that awful fire again!” cried Mrs. Hey-wood. “These flats seem to have no chimneys.”

“It’s nothing to do with the flat,” said Herbert. “It’s that fool Mollie. The girl doesn’t know how to light a decent fire!”

He rang the bell furiously, keeping his finger on the electric knob.

“The creature has absolutely nothing to do, and what she does she spoils.”

Mollie came in with a look of mutiny on her face.

“Look at that fire,” said Herbert fiercely.

“I am looking at it,” said Mollie.

“Why don’t you do your work properly? See to the beastly thing, can’t you?”

Mollie folded her arms and spoke firmly.

“If you please, sir, wild horses won’t make me touch it again.”

“It’s not a question of horse-power,” said Herbert. “Go and get an old newspaper and hold it in front of the bars.”

“I am just in the middle of the sandwiches,” said Mollie.

“Well, get out of them, then,” said Herbert.

Mollie delivered her usual ultimatum.

“If you please, sir, I beg to give a month’s notice.”

“Bosh!” said Herbert.

“Bosh indeed!” cried Mollie. “We’ll see if it’s bosh! If you want any sandwiches for your precious visitors you can cut ‘em yourself.”

With this challenge she went out of the room and slammed the door behind her.

Herbert breathed deeply, and after a moment’s struggle in his soul spoke mildly.

“Mother, go and pacify the fool, will you?”

“She is very obstinate,” said Mrs. Heywood.

“All women are obstinate.”

Suddenly the man’s self-restraint broke down and he became excited.

“Bribe her, promise her a rise in wages, but for God’s sake see that she cuts the sandwiches. We don’t want to be made fools of before our guests.”

“Very well, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood. She hesitated for a moment at the door, and before going out said: “But Mollie can be very violent at times.”

For a little while there was silence between the husband and wife. Then Herbert spoke rather sternly.

“Clare, are you or are you not going to get dressed?”

“I shall get dressed in good time,” said Clare quietly, “when I think fit. Surely you don’t want to dictate to me about that?”

“Surely,” said Herbert, “you can see how awkward it will be if any of our people arrive and find you unprepared for them?”

Clare gave a long, weary sigh.

“Oh, I am prepared for them. I have been trying to prepare myself all day for the ordeal of, them.”

“The ordeal? What the dickens do you mean?”

“I am prepared for Mrs. Atkinson Brown, who, when she takes off her hat in the bedroom, will ask me whether I am suited and whether I am expecting.”

“For goodness’ sake don’t be coarse, Clare,” said Herbert.

“It’s Mrs. Atkinson Brown who is coarse,” said Clare. “And I am prepared for Mr. Atkinson Brown, who will say that it is horrible weather for this time of year, and that business has been the very devil since there has been a Radical Government, and that these outrageous women who are breaking windows ought to be whipped. Oh, I could tell you everything that everybody is going to say. I have heard it over and over again.”

“It does not seem to make much effect on you,” said Herbert. “Especially that part about breaking windows.”

Clare smiled.

“So you have guessed, have you?”

“I knew at once by the look on your face.”

“I thought you agreed with your mother that some Suffragette must have flung a stone from the outside.”

“I hid the truth from mother,” said Herbert. “She would think you were mad. What on earth made you do it? Were you mad or what?”

Clare brushed her hair back from her forehead.

“Sometimes I used to think I was going a little mad. But now I know what is the matter with me.”

Herbert spoke more tenderly.

“What is the matter, Clare? If it is a question of a doctor——”

“It’s the Eighth Year,” said Clare.

“The Eighth Year?”

“Yes, that’s what is the matter with me.”

“What on earth do you mean?” asked Herbert.

“Why, don’t you know? It was Madge Vernon who told me.”

“Told you what?”

“She seemed to think that everybody knew.”

“Knew what?” asked Herbert, exasperated beyond all patience.

“About the Eighth Year.”

“What about it?”

“It’s well known, she says, that the Eighth Year is the most dangerous one in marriage. It is then that the pull comes, when the wife has found out her husband.”

“Found out her husband?”

“And found out herself.”

Herbert spoke roughly. He was not in a mood for such mysteries.

“Look here,” he said. “I can’t listen to all this nonsense. Go and dress yourself.”

“I want to talk to you, Herbert,” said Clare very earnestly. “I must talk to you before it’s too late.”

“It’s too late now,” said Herbert. “Halfpast six. I must fetch that whisky and buy a few flowers. I shall have to put on my boots again and splash about in the mud in these trousers. Confound it!”

“Before you go you must listen, Herbert,” said Clare, with a sign of emotion. “Perhaps you won’t have another chance.”

“Thank Heaven for that.”

“When I broke that window something else broke.”

“One of my best vases,” said Herbert with sarcasm.

“I think something in my own nature broke too. My spirit has broken out of this narrow, deadening little life of ours, out of the smug snobbishness and stupidity which for so long kept me prisoner, out of the belief that the latest sentimental novel, the latest romantic play, the latest bit of tittle-tattle from my neighbors might satisfy my heart and brain. When I broke that window I let a little fresh air into the stifling atmosphere of this flat, where I have been mewed up without work, without any kind of honest interest, without any kind of food for my brain or soul.”

Herbert stared at his wife, and made an impatient gesture.

“If you want work, why don’t you attend to your domestic duties?”

“I have no domestic duties,” said Clare. “That is the trouble.”

Herbert laughed in an unpleasant way.

“Why, you haven’t even bought any flowers to decorate your home! Isn’t that a domestic duty?”

Clare answered him quickly, excitedly.

“It’s just a part of the same old hypocrisy of keeping up appearances. You know you don’t care for flowers in themselves, except as they help to make a show. You want to impress our guests. You want to keep up the old illusion of the woman’s hand in the home. The woman’s touch. Isn’t that it?”

“Yes, I do want to keep up that illusion,” said Herbert; “and by God, I find it very hard! You say you want an object in life. Isn’t your husband an object?”

Clare looked at him with a queer, pitiful smile.

“Yes, he is,” she said slowly.

“Well, what more do you want?”

“Lots more. A woman’s life is not centered for ever in one man.”

“It ought to be,” said Herbert. “If you had any religious principles——”

“Oh,” said Clare sharply, “but you object to my religion!”

“Well, of course I mean in moderation.”

“You have starved me, Herbert, and oh, I am so hungry!”

Herbert answered her airily.

“Well, there will be light refreshments later.”

“Yes, that is worthy of you,” cried Clare. “That is your sense of humor! You have starved my soul and starved my heart and you offer me—sandwiches. I am hungry for life and you offer me—the latest novel.”

Herbert paced up and down the room. He was losing control of his temper.

“That is the reward for all my devotion!” he said. “Don’t I drudge in the city every day to keep you in comfort?”

“I don’t want comfort!” said Clare.

“Don’t I toil so that you may have pretty frocks?”

“I don’t want pretty frocks.”

“Don’t I scrape and scheme to buy you little luxuries?”

“I don’t want little luxuries,” said Clare.

“Is there anything within my means that you haven’t got?”

Clare looked at him in a peculiar way, and answered quietly—

“I haven’t a child,” she said.

“Oh, Lord,” said Herbert uneasily. “Whose fault is that? Besides, modern life in small flats is not cut out for children.”

“And modern life in small flats,” said Clare, “is not cut out for wives.”

“It isn’t my fault,” said Herbert. “I am not the architect—either of fate or flats.”

“No, it isn’t your fault, Herbert. You can’t help your character. It isn’t your fault that when you come home from the city you fall asleep after dinner. It isn’t your fault that when you go to the club I sit at home with my hands in my lap, thinking and brooding. It isn’t your fault that your mother and I get on each other’s nerves. It isn’t your fault that you and I have grown out of each other, that we bore each other and have nothing to say to each other—except when we quarrel.”

“Well, then,” said Herbert, “whose fault is it?”

“I don’t know,” said Clare. “I suppose it’s a fault of the system, which is spoiling thousands of marriages just like ours. It’s the fault which is found out—in the Eighth Year.”

“Oh, curse the Eighth Year,” said Herbert violently. “What is that bee you have got in your bonnet?”

“It’s a bee which keeps buzzing in my brain. It’s a little bee which whispers queer words to me—tempting words. It says you must break away from the system or the system will break you. You must find a way of escape or die. You must do it quickly, now, to-night, or it will be too late. Herbert, a hungry woman will do desperate things to satisfy her appetite, and I am hungry for some stronger emotion than I can find within these four walls. I am hungry for love, hungry for work, hungry for life. If you can’t give it to me, I must find it elsewhere.”

“Clare,” said Herbert, with deliberate self-restraint, “I must again remind you that time is getting on and you are not yet dressed. In a little while our guests will be here. I hope you don’t mean to hold me up to the contempt of my friends. I at least have some sense of duty.... I am going to fetch the whisky.” As he strode toward the door he started back at the noise of breaking china.

“What’s that?” asked Clare.

“God knows,” said Herbert. “I expect mother has broken a window.”

The words were hardly out of his mouth before Mrs. Heywood came in in a state of great agitation.

“Herbert, I must really ask you to come into the kitchen.”

“What’s the matter now?” asked Herbert, prepared for the worst.

“Mollie has deliberately broken our best coffee-pot.”

Herbert stared at his wife.

“Didn’t I tell you so!” he said.

“Why has she broken the coffee-pot?” asked Clare.

“She was most insolent,” said Mrs. Heywood, “and said my interference got on her nerves.”

“Well, even a servant has nerves,” said Clare.

“But it was the best coffee-pot, Clare. Surely you are not going to take it so calmly?”

“Like mistress like maid!” said Herbert. “Oh, my hat! Why on earth did I marry?”

“Don’t you think you had better fetch the whisky?” said Clare gently.

Herbert became excited again.

“I have been trying to fetch the whisky for the last half hour. There is a conspiracy against it. Confound it, I will fetch the whisky.”

He strode to the door, as though he would get the whisky or die in the attempt.

“I think you ought to speak to Mollie first,” said Mrs. Heywood.

Herbert raised his hands above his head.

“Damn Mollie!” he shouted wildly. Then he strode out of the room. “Damn everything!”

“Poor dear,” said Mrs. Heywood. “I wish he didn’t get so worried.”

“Clare, won’t you come and speak to Mollie?”

“Haven’t you spoken to her?” asked Clare wearily.

“I am always speaking to her.”

“Poor Mollie!” said Clare.

Mrs. Heywood was hurt at the tone of pity. She flushed a little and then turned to her daughter-in-law with reproachful eyes.

“I am an old woman, Clare, and the mother of your husband. Because my position forces me to live in this flat, I do not think you ought to insult me.”

“I’m sorry,” said Clare with sincerity.

“Mollie is right. We all get on each other’s nerves. It can’t be helped, I suppose. It’s part of the system.”

“I can’t help being your mother-in-law, Clare.”

“No, it can’t he helped,” said Clare.

Mrs. Heywood came close to her and touched her hand.

“You think I do not understand. You think you are the only one who has any grievance.”

“Oh, no!” said Clare. “I am not so egotistical.”

Mrs. Heywood smoothed down her dress with trembling hands.

“You think I haven’t been watching you all these years. I have watched you so that I know your thoughts behind those brooding eyes, Clare. I know all that you have been thinking and suffering, so that sometimes you hate me, so that my very presence here in the room with you makes you wish to cry out, to shriek, because I am your mother-in-law, and the mother of your husband. The husband always loves his mother best, and the wife always knows it. That is the eternal tragedy of the mother-in-law. Because she is hated by the wife of her son, and is an intruder in her home. I know that because I too suffered from a mother-in-law. Do you think I would stay here an hour unless I was forced to stay, for a shelter above my old head, for some home in which I wait to die? But while I wait I watch... and I know that you have reached a dangerous stage in a woman’s life, when she may do any rash thing. Clare, I pray every night that you may pass that stage in life without doing anything—rash. This time always comes in marriage, it comes——”

“In the Eighth Year?” asked Clare eagerly. “Somewhere about then.”

“Ah! I thought so.”

“It came to me, my dear.”

“And did you do anything rash?”

Mrs. Heywood hesitated a moment before replying.

“I gave birth to Herbert,” she said.

“Good Heavens!” said Clare.

“It saved me from breaking——”

“Windows, mother?”

“No, my own and my husband’s heart,” said Mrs. Heywood. “Well, I will go and speak to Mollie again. Goodness knows how we shall get coffee to-night.”

She went out of the room with her head shaking a little after this scene of emotion.

Clare spoke to herself aloud. She had her hands up to her throat.

“I don’t want coffee to-night. I want stronger drink. I want to get drunk with liberty of life.”

Suddenly there was a noise at the window and the woman looked up, startled, and cried, “Who is there?”

Gerald Bradshaw appeared at the open French window leading on to the balcony, and he spoke through the window.

“It is I, Clare? Are you alone?”

Clare had risen from her chair at the sound of his voice, and her face became very pale.

“Gerald... How did you come there?”

Gerald Bradshaw laughed in his lighthearted way.

“I stepped over the bar that divides our balconies. It was quite easy. It was as easy as it will be to cross the bar that divides you and me, Clare.”

Clare spoke in a frightened voice.

“Why do you come here, at this hour?”

“Why do I ever come?” asked Gerald Bradshaw.

“I don’t know.”

“It’s because I want you. I want you badly to-night, Clare. I can’t wait for you any longer.”

Clare spoke pleadingly.

“Gerald... go away... it’s so dangerous... I daren’t listen to you.”

“I want you to listen,” said Gerald Bradshaw.

“Go away... I implore you to go away.”

He laughed at her. He seemed very much amused.

“Not before I have said what I want to say.”

“Say it quickly,” said Clare. “Quickly!”

“There’s time enough,” said Bradshaw. “This is what I want to say. You are a lonely woman and I am a lonely man, and only an iron bar divides us. It’s the iron bar of convention, of insincerity, of superstition. It seems so difficult to cross. But you see one step is enough. I want you to take that step—to-night.”

Clare answered him in a whisper.

“Go away!”

“I am hungry for you,” said Bradshaw, with a thrill in his voice. “I am hungry for your love. And you are hungry for me. I have seen it in your eyes. You have the look of a famished woman. Famished for love. Famished for comradeship.”

Clare raised her hands despairingly.

“If you have any pity, go away.”

“I have no pity. Because pity is weakness, and I hate weakness.”

“You are brutal,” said Clare.

He laughed at her. He seemed to like those words.

“Yes, I have the brutality of manhood. Man is a brute, and woman likes the brute in him because that is his nature, and woman wants the natural man. That is why you want me, Clare. You can’t deny it.”

Clare protested feebly.

“I do deny it. I must deny it.”

“It’s a funny thing,” said Gerald Bradshaw. “Between you and me there is a queer spell, Clare. I was conscious of it when I first met you. Something in you calls to me. Something in me calls to you. It is the call of the wild.”

Clare was scared now. These words seemed to make her heart beat to a strange tune.

“What do you mean?” she said.

“It is the call of the untamed creature. Both you and I are untamed. We both have the spirit of the woods. I am Pan. You are a wood nymph, imprisoned in a cage, upholstered by maple, on the hire system.”

“What do you want with me?” asked Clare. It was clear that he was tempting her.

“I want to play with you, like Pan played. You and I will hear the pipes of Pan to-night—the wild nature music.”

“To-night?”

“To-night. I have waited too long for you, and now I’m impatient. I am alone in my flat waiting for you. I ask you to keep me company, not to-night only, but until we tire of each other, until perhaps we hate each other. Who knows?”

“Oh, God!” said Clare. She moaned out the words in a pitiful way.

“You have only to slip down one flight of stairs and steal up another, and you will find me at the door with a welcome. It will need just a little care to escape from your prison. You must slip on your hat and cloak as though you were going round to church, and then come to me, to me, Clare! Only a wall will divide you from this flat, but you will be a world away. For you will have escaped from this upholstered cage into a little world of liberty. Into a little world of love, Clare. Say you will come!”

“Oh, God!” moaned Clare.

“You will come?”

“Are you the Devil that you tempt me?” said Clare.

Gerald gave a triumphant little laugh.

“You will come! Clare, my sweetheart, I know you will come, for your spirit is ready for me.”

As he spoke these words there was the sound of a bell ringing through the flat, and the noise of it struck terror into Clare Heywood.

“Go away,” she whispered. “For God’s sake go! Some one is ringing.”

“I will cross the bar again,” said Bradshaw. “But I shall be waiting at the door. You will not be very long, little one?”

Clare sank down with her face in her hands. And Gerald stole away from the window just as Mollie showed in Madge Vernon.

“It’s our At Home night,” said Mollie, as she came in, “and they’ll be here presently.”

“All right, Mollie,” said Miss Vernon, smiling. “I shan’t stay more than a minute. I know I have come at an awkward time.”

“She would come in, ma’am,” said Mollie, as though she were not strong enough to thwart such a determined visitor.

As soon as the girl had gone Madge Vernon came across to Clare, very cheerfully and rather excitedly.

“Clare, are you coming?”

“Coming where?” asked Clare, trying to hide her agitation.

“To the demonstration,” said Madge Vernon. “You know I told you all about it! It begins at eight. It will be immense fun, and after your window-smashing exploit you are one of us. Good Heavens, I think you have beaten us all. None of us have ever thought of breaking our own windows.”

“It’s my At Home night,” said Clare.

“Oh, bother the At Home. Can’t your husband look after his friends for once? I wanted you to join in this adventure. It would be your enrolment in the ranks, and it will do you a lot of good, in your present state of health.”

“In any case——” said Clare.

“What?”

Clare smiled in a tragic way.

“I have received a previous invitation.”

“Oh, drat the invitation.”

“Of course I should have liked to come,” said Clare, “but——”

Madge Vernon was impatient with her. “But what? I hate that word ‘but.’”

“The spirit is willing but the flesh is weak,” said Clare, speaking with a deeper significance than appeared in the words.

“There is no weakness about you. You have the courage of your convictions. Have you had the window mended yet?”

She laughed gaily and then listened with her head a little on one side to the sound of a bell ringing in the hall.

“That must be Herbert,” said Clare. “I think you had better go.”

“Yes, I think I had better,” said Madge, laughing again. “If looks could kill——”

She went toward the door and opened it, but I stood on the threshold looking back.

“Won’t you come? Eight o’clock, you know.”

Clare smiled weakly.

“I am in great demand to-night.”

The two women listened to Herbert’s voice in the hall saying—

“Of course all the shops were shut.”

“Oh, Lord!” said Madge, “I must skedaddle.” She went out of the room hurriedly, leaving Clare alone.

And after a moment or two Clare spoke aloud, with her hands clasped upon her breast.

“I wonder if the Devil is tempting me tonight?” she said.

Then Herbert entered with two whisky bottles.

“I had to hunt all over the place,” he said.

Then he saw that his wife was still in her afternoon frock, and his face flushed with anger.

“What, aren’t you dressed yet?... I think you might show some respect for my wishes, Clare.”

“I am going to dress now,” said Clare, and she rose and went into the bedroom.

“Women are the very devil,” said Herbert, unwrapping the whisky bottles.

While he was busy with this his mother came in, having changed her dress.

“Oh, I am glad you managed to get the whisky,” she said.

“Of course nearly every blessed shop was shut,” said Herbert. “They always are when I run out of everything. It’s this Radical Government, with its beastly Acts.”

Mrs. Heywood hesitated and then came across to her son and touched him on the arm.

“I think you had better come into the kitchen a moment, dear, and look after Mollie.”

“She hasn’t broken anything else, has she?” said Herbert anxiously.

“No, dear. But she has just cut her finger rather badly. She got in a temper with the sandwiches.”

Herbert raised his hands to heaven.

“Why do these things always happen when Clare gives an At Home? I shall abolish these evenings altogether. They will drive me mad.”

“Oh, they’re very pleasant when they once begin,” said Mrs. Heywood.

“I’m glad you think so, mother. I am damned if I do. I was only saying to Clare to-night——”

He stalked out of the room furiously.

Mrs. Heywood stood for a few moments staring at the carpet. Her lips moved and her worn old hands plucked at her skirt.

“Every time there is an At Home at this flat,” she said, “I get another white hair.”

She moved toward the door and went out of the room, so that it was left empty.

Outside in the street a piano-organ was playing a rag-time tune with a rattle of notes, and motor-cars were sounding their horns.

In this little drawing-room in Intellectual Mansions, Battersea Park, there was silence, except for those vague sounds from without. There was no sign here of Fate’s presence, summoning a woman to her destiny. No angel stood with a flaming sword to bar the way to a woman with a wild heart. The little ormolu clock ticking on the mantel-shelf did not seem to be counting the moments of a tragic drama. It was a very commonplace little room, and the flamboyant chintz on the sofa and chairs gave it an air of cheerfulness, as though this were one of the happy homes of England.

Presently the bedroom door opened slowly, and Clare Heywood stood there looking into the drawing-room and listening. She was very pale, and was dressed in her outdoor things, as Gerald Bradshaw had asked her to dress, in her hat and cloak, so that she might slip out of the flat which he had called her prison.

She came further into the room, timidly, like a hare frightened by the distant baying of the hounds.

She raised her hands to her bosom, and spoke in a whisper:

“God forgive me!”

Then she crossed the floor, listened for a moment intently at the door, and slipped out. A moment or two later one’s ears, if they had been listening, would have heard the front door shut.

Clare Heywood had escaped.

A little while later Mrs. Heywood, her mother-in-law, came into the room again and went over to the piano to open it and arrange the music.

“I do hope Clare is getting dressed,” she said, speaking to herself.

Then Herbert came in, carrying a tray with decanter and glasses.

“Isn’t Clare ready yet?” he asked.

“No, dear. She won’t be long.”

“I can’t find the corkscrew,” said Herbert, searching round for it, but failing to discover its whereabouts.

“Isn’t it in the kitchen, dear?” asked Mrs. Heywood.

“Not unless Mollie has swallowed it. It’s just the sort of thing she would do—out of sheer spite.”

“Didn’t you use it the other day to open a tin of sardines?” asked the old lady, cudgelling her brains.

“Did I?” said Herbert. “Oh, Lord, yes! I left it in the bathroom.”

He went out of the room to find it.

Mrs. Heywood crossed over to the fire and swept up the grate.

“Clare is a very long time to-night,” she said.

Then Mollie came in carrying a tray with some plates of sandwiches. One of her fingers was tied up with a rag.

“It’s a good job the guests is late to-night,” she remarked.

“Yes, we are all very behind-hand,” said Mrs. Heywood.

Mollie dumped down the tray and gave vent to a little of her impertinent philosophy:

“I’ll never give an At Home when I’m married. Blest if I do. Social ‘ipocrisy, I call them.”

Mrs. Heywood rebuked her sharply:

“We don’t want your opinion, Mollie, thank you.”

“I suppose I can have a few opinions, although I am in service,” said Mollie. “There’s plenty of time for thought even in the kitchen of a flat like this. I wonder domestic servants don’t write novels. My word, what a revelation it would be! I’ve a good mind to write one of them serials in the Daily Mail.”

“If I have any more of your impudence, Mollie——”

“It’s not impudence,” said Mollie. “It’s aspirations.”

The girl was silent when her master came into the room with the corkscrew.

“It wasn’t in the bathroom,” he explained. “I remember now, I used it for cleaning out my pipe.”

“I could have told you that a long time ago, sir,” said Mollie.

“Well, why the dickens didn’t you?” asked Herbert.

“You never asked me, sir.”

Mollie retired with the air of having scored a point.

“Well, as long as you’ve found it, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood.

“Unfortunately, I broke the point. However, I daresay I can make it do.”

He pulled one of the corks out of the whisky bottle and filled the decanter.

“Hasn’t Clare finished dressing yet?” he said presently. “What on earth is she doing?”

“I expect she wants her blouse done up at the back,” said Mrs. Heywood.

Herbert jerked up his head.

“And then she complains because I can’t tie my own tie I Just like women.”

He drew out another cork rather violently and said:

“Well, go and see after her, mother.”

Mrs. Heywood went toward the bedroom door and called out in her silvery voice:

“Are you ready, dear?”

She listened for a moment, and called out again:

“Clare!”

Herbert poured some more whisky into the decanter.

“I expect she’s reading one of those beastly pamphlets,” he said.

Mrs. Heywood tapped at the bedroom door.

“Clare!”

“Go in, mother,” said Herbert irritably.

“It’s very strange!” said Mrs. Heywood in an anxious voice.

She went into the bedroom, and Herbert, who had been watching her, spilled some of the whisky, so that he muttered to himself:

“What with women and what with whisky——”

He did not finish his sentence, but stared in the direction of the bedroom as though suspecting something was wrong.

Mrs. Heywood came trembling out. She had a scared look.

“Oh, Herbert!”

Herbert was alarmed by the look on her face.

“Is Clare ill—or something?”

“She isn’t there,” said Mrs. Heywood.

The old lady was rather breathless.

“Not there!” said Herbert in a dazed way.

“She went in to dress a few minutes ago,” said his mother.

Herbert stared at her. He was really very much afraid, but he spoke irritably:

“Well, she can’t have gone up the chimney, can she? At least, I suppose not, though you never can tell nowadays.”

He strode toward the bedroom door and called out:

“Clare!”

Then he went inside.

Mrs. Heywood stood watching the open door. She raised her hands up and then let them fall, and spoke in a hoarse kind of whisper:

“I think it has happened at last.”

Herbert came out of the bedroom again. He looked pale, and had gloomy eyes.

“It’s devilish queer!” he said.

Mother and son stood looking at each other, as though in the presence of tragedy.

“She must have gone out,” said Mrs. Hey-wood.

“Gone out! What makes you think so?”

“She has taken her hat and cloak.”

“How do you know?” asked Herbert.

“I looked in the wardrobe.”

“Good Heavens! Where’s she gone to?”

Mrs. Heywood’s thin old hands clutched at the white lace upon her bosom.

“Herbert, I—I am afraid.”

The man went deadly white. He stammered as he spoke:

“You don’t mean that she is going to do something—foolish?”

“Something rash,” said Mrs. Hey wood mournfully.

Herbert had a sudden idea. It took away from his fear a little and made him angry.

“Perhaps she has gone round to church. If so, I will give her a piece of my mind when she comes back. It’s outrageous! It’s shameful.”

There was the sound of a bell ringing through the hall, and the mother and son listened intently.

“Perhaps she has come back,” said Herbert. “Perhaps she went to fetch some flowers.” This idea seemed to soften him. His voice broke a little when he said: “Poor girl! I didn’t mean to make such a fuss about them.” “It isn’t Clare,” said Mrs. Heywood, shaking her head. “It’s a visitor. I hear Mr. Atkinson Brown’s voice.”

Mr. Atkinson Brown’s voice could be heard quite plainly in the hall:

“Well, Mollie, is your mistress quite well?” Herbert grasped his mother’s arm and whispered to her excitedly:

“Mother, we must hide it from them.”

“Yes,” said Mrs. Heywood. “If the Atkinson Browns suspect anything it will be all over the neighborhood.”

Herbert had a look of anguish in his eyes. “Good Heavens, yes. My reputation will be ruined.”

Once again they heard Mr. Atkinson Brown’s voice in the hall.

“I see we are the first to arrive,” he said in a loud, cheery tone.

“Mother,” whispered Herbert, “we must keep up appearances, at all costs.”

“I’ll try to, darling,” said Mrs. Heywood, clasping his arm for a moment.

Herbert made a desperate effort to be hopeful.

“Clare is sure to be back in a few minutes. We’re frightening ourselves for nothing.... I shall have something to say to her to-night when the guests are gone.”

Mrs. Heywood’s eyes filled with tears, and she looked at her son as though she knew that Clare would never come back.

“My poor boy!” she said.

“Play the game, mother,” said Herbert. “For Heaven’s sake play the game.”

He had no sooner whispered these words than Mr. and Mrs. Atkinson Brown entered the room, having taken off their outdoor things. Mr. Brown was a tall, stout, heavily built man with a bald head and a great expanse of white waistcoat. His wife was a little bird-like woman in pink silk. They were both elaborately cheerful.

“Hulloh, Heywood, my boy!” said the elderly man.

“So delighted to come!” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown to Herbert’s mother.

Herbert grasped the man’s hand and wrung it warmly.

“Good of you to come. Devilish good.”

“Glad to come,” said Mr. Atkinson Brown. “Glad to come, my lad. How’s the wife?”

“Yes,” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown, glancing round the room. “Where’s dear Clare?... Well, I hope.”

Herbert tried to hide his extreme nervousness.

“Oh, tremendously fit, thanks. She’ll be here in a minute or two.”

Mrs. Heywood appeared less nervous than her son. Yet her voice trembled a little when she said:

“Do sit down, Mrs. Atkinson Brown.”

She pulled a chair up, but the lady protested laughingly:

“Oh, not so near the fire. I can’t afford to neglect my complexion at my time of life!”

Her husband was rubbing his hands in front of the fire. He had no complexion to spoil.

“Horrible weather for this time o’ year,” he said.

“Damnable,” said Herbert, agreeing with him almost too cordially.

“Is dear Clare suited at present?” asked the lady.

“Well,” said Mrs. Heywood, “we still have Mollie, but she is a great trouble—a very great trouble.”

“Oh, the eternal servant problem!” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown. “I thought I had a perfect jewel, but I found her inebriated in the kitchen only yesterday.”

Herbert was racking his brains for conversational subjects. He fell back on an old one. “Business going strong?”

“Business!” said Mr. Atkinson Brown. “My dear boy, business has been the very devil since this Radical Government has been in power.”

“I am sure there has been a great deal of trouble in the world lately,” said Mrs. Heywood.

“I’m sure I can’t bear to read even the dear Daily Mail,” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown.

“What with murders and revolutions and eloping vicars and suffragettes——”

“Those outrageous women ought to be whipped,” said her husband. “Spoiled my game of golf last Saturday. Found ‘Votes for Women’ on the first green. Made me positively ill.”

“I am glad dear Clare is so sensible,” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown.

“Yes. Oh, quite so,” said Mrs. Heywood, flushing a little.

“Oh, rather!” said Herbert.

“We domestic women are in the minority now,” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown.

“The spirit of revolt is abroad, Herbert,” said her husband. “Back to the Home is the only watchword which will save the country from these shameless hussies. Flog ‘em back, I would. Thank God our wives have more sense.”

“Yes, there’s something in that,” said Herbert.

Mrs. Atkinson Brown was gazing round the room curiously. She seemed to suspect something.

“You are sure dear Clare is quite well?” she asked. “No little trouble?”

“She is having a slight trouble with her back hair,” said Herbert. “Won’t lie down, you know.”

He laughed loudly, as though he had made a good joke.

Mrs. Atkinson Brown half rose from her chair.

“Oh, let me go to the rescue of the dear thing!”

Herbert was terror-stricken.

“No—no! It was only my joke,” he said eagerly. “She will be here in a minute. Do sit down.”

Mrs. Heywood remembered her promise to “play the game.”

“Won’t you sing something, dear?” she said to her visitor.

“Oh, not so early in the evening,” said the lady. “Besides, I have a most awful cold.”

“Oh, I’m so sorry,” said Herbert. “I am beastly sorry.”

As he spoke the bell rang again, and Herbert went over to his mother and whispered to her:

“Do you think that is Clare? My God, this is awful!”

“Clare was not looking very well the other day when I saw her,” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown. “I thought perhaps she was sickening for something.”

“Oh, I assure you she was never better in her life,” said Herbert.

“But you men are so unobservant. I am dying to see dear Clare, to ask her how she feels. Are you sure I can’t be of any use to her?”

She rose again from her chair, and Herbert gave a beseeching look to his mother.

“Oh, quite sure, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood. “Do sit down.”

“Besides, you have such a frightful cold,” said Herbert, with extreme anxiety. “Do keep closer to the fire.”

Mrs. Atkinson Brown laughed a little curiously:

“You seem very anxious to keep me from dear Clare!”

This persistence annoyed her husband and he rebuked her sternly.

“Sit still, Beatrice, can’t you? Don’t you see that we have arrived a little early and that we have taken Clare unawares? Let the poor girl go on with her dressing.”

“Don’t bully me in other people’s flats, Charles,” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown. “I have enough of it at home.”

Her husband was not to be quelled.

“Herbert and I can hardly hear ourselves speak,” he growled, “you keep up such a clatter.”

Mrs. Atkinson Brown flared up.

“I come out to get the chance of speaking a little. For eight years now I have been listening to your interminable monologues, and can’t get a word in edgeways.”

“Stuff and nonsense!” said her husband.

“Have you been married eight years already, my dear?” asked Mrs. Heywood in a tone of amiable surprise.

“Well, we are in our Eighth Year,” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown.

Mrs. Heywood seemed startled.

“Oh, I see,” she said thoughtfully.

“I assure you it seems longer,” said the lady. “I suppose it’s because Charles makes me so very tired sometimes.”

Two other visitors now arrived. They were Mr. Hargreaves and his wife: the former a young man in immaculate evening clothes, with lofty manners; the latter a tall, thin, elegant, bored-looking woman, supercilious and snobbish.

Herbert went forward hurriedly to his new guests.

“How splendid of you to come! How are you, sir?”

“Oh, pretty troll-loll, thanks,” said Mr. Hargreaves.

Herbert shook hands with Mrs. Hargreaves.

“How do you do?”

“We’re rather late,” said the lady, “but this is in an out-of-the-way neighborhood, is it not?”

“Oh, do you think so?” said Herbert. “I always considered Battersea Park very central.”

Mrs. Hargreaves raised her eyebrows.

“It’s having to get across the river that makes the journey so very tedious. I should die if I had to live across the river.”

“There’s something in what you say,” said Herbert, anxious to agree with everybody. “I must apologize for dragging you all this way. Of course, you people in Mayfair——Won’t you sit down?”

Mr. Hargreaves became a victim of mistaken identity, shaking hands with Mrs. Atkinson Brown.

“Mrs. Heywood, I presume. I must introduce myself.”

Mrs. Hargreaves also greeted the other lady, under the same impression.

“Oh, how do you do? So delighted to make your acquaintance.”

Mrs. Atkinson Brown was much amused, and laughed gaily.

“But I am not Mrs. Heywood. I cannot boast of such a handsome husband!”

“Oh, can’t you, by Jove!” said Mr. Atkinson Brown, rather nettled by his wife’s candor.

“Oh, I beg pardon,” said Mr. Hargreaves. “Where is Mrs. Heywood?”

“Yes, where is Mrs. Heywood?” said his wife.

Herbert looked wildly at his mother.

“Where is she, mother? Do tell her to hurry up.

“Yes, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood meekly. She moved uncertainly toward the bedroom door, and then hesitated: “Perhaps she will not be very long now.”

“The fact is,” said Herbert desperately, “she is not very well.”

Mrs. Atkinson Brown was astounded.

“But you said she was perfectly well!”

“Did I?” said Herbert. “Oh, well, er—one has to say these things, you know. Polite fictions, eh?”

He laughed nervously.

“The fact is, she has a little headache. Hasn’t she, mother?”

“Yes, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood. “You know best.”

Mrs. Atkinson Brown rose from her chair again.

“Oh, I will go and see how the poor dear feels. So bad of you to hide it from us.”

“Oh, please sit down,” said Herbert in a voice of anguish. “I assure you it is nothing very much. She will be in directly. Make yourself at home, Mrs. Hargreaves. This chair? Mother, show Mrs. Atkinson Brown Clare’s latest photograph.”

“Oh, yes!” said Mrs. Heywood. “It is an excellent likeness.”

“But I want to see Clare herself!” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown plaintively.

“Sit down, Beatrice!” said her husband.

“Bully!” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown, sitting down with a flop.

Herbert addressed himself to Mr. Hargreaves.

“Draw up your chair, sir. You will have a cigar, I am sure.”

He offered him one from a newly opened box. Mr. Hargreaves took one, smelled it, and then put it back.

“No, thanks,” he said. “I will have one of my own, if I may. Sure the ladies don’t mind?”

“Oh, they like it,” said Herbert.

“We have to pretend to,” said Mrs. Hargreaves.

“Well, if you don’t, you ought to,” said her husband. “It’s a man’s privilege.”

Mrs. Hargreaves smiled icily.

“One of his many privileges.”

“Will you have a cigarette, Mrs. Hargreaves?” said Herbert.

But Mr. Hargreaves interposed:

“Oh, I don’t allow my wife to smoke. It’s a beastly habit.”

Mr. Atkinson Brown, who had accepted one of Herbert’s cigars, but after some inquiry had also decided to smoke one of his own, applauded this sentiment with enthusiasm.

“Hear, hear! Hear, hear! Disgusting habit for women.”

“Of course I agree with you,” said Herbert. “Clare never smokes. But I don’t lay down the law for other people’s wives.”

Mr. Hargreaves laughed.

“A very sound notion, Heywood. It takes all one’s time to manage one’s own, eh?”

“And then it is not always effective,” said his wife. “Even the worm will turn.”

Mr. Hargreaves answered his wife with a heavy retort:

“If it does I knock it on the head with a spade.”

Mr. Atkinson Brown laughed loudly again. He seemed to like this man Hargreaves.

“Good epigram! By Jove, I must remember that!”

Herbert was on tenter-hooks when the conversation languished a little.

“Won’t you sing a song, Mrs. Atkinson Brown? I am sure my friend, Mr. Hargreaves, will appreciate your voice.”

“Oh, rather!” said Hargreaves. “Though I don’t pretend to understand a note of music.” Mrs. Atkinson Brown shook her head:

“I couldn’t think of singing before our hostess appears.”

The lady’s husband seemed at last to have caught the spirit of her suspicion. He spoke in a hoarse whisper to his wife:

“Where the devil is the woman?”

Herbert Heywood realized that he was on the edge of a precipice. Not much longer could he hold on to this intolerable situation. He tried to speak cheerfully, but there was anguish in his voice when he said:

“Well, let’s have a game of nap.”

“Oh, Lord, no,” said Hargreaves. “I only play nap on the way to a race. You don’t sport a billiard table, do you?”

Herbert Heywood was embarrassed.

“Er—a billiard table?” He looked round the room as though he might discover a billiard table. “I’m afraid not.”

“Don’t be absurd, Edward,” said Mrs. Hargreaves. “People don’t play billiards on the wrong side of the river.”

Conversation languished again, and Herbert was becoming desperate. He seized upon the sandwiches and handed them round.

“Won’t anybody have a sandwich to pass the time away? Mrs. Hargreaves?”

Mrs. Hargreaves laughed in her supercilious way.

“It’s rather early, isn’t it?”

“Good Lord, no!” said Herbert. “I am sure you must be hungry. Let me beg of you—Mother, haven’t you got any cake anywhere?”

“Yes, dear,” said Mrs. Heywood. She, too, was suffering mental tortures.

“Atkinson Brown. You will have a sandwich,” said Herbert.

He bent over to his visitor and spoke in a gloomy voice:

“Take one, for God’s sake.”

Atkinson Brown was startled.

“Yes! Yes! By all means,” he said hastily. Herbert handed the sandwiches about rather wildly. “Mother, you will have one, won’t you? Mrs. Atkinson Brown?... And one for me, eh?”

Mrs. Hargreaves eyed her host curiously.

“I hope your wife is not seriously unwell, Mr. Heywood.”

Herbert was losing his nerve.

“Can’t we talk of something else?” he said despairingly. “What is your handicap at golf?”

“My husband objects to my playing golf,” said the lady.

“It takes women out of the home so much,” said Hargreaves. “Play with the babies is my motto for women.”

Mrs. Atkinson Brown shook her finger at him, and laughed in a shrill voice:

“But supposing they haven’t got any babies?”

“They ought to have ‘em,” said Hargreaves.

It was Atkinson Brown who interrupted this interesting discussion, which promised to bring up the great problem of eugenics, so favored now as a drawing-room topic. He had been turning his sandwich this way and that, and he leaned forward to his host:

“Excuse me, Herbert, old man. There’s something the matter with this sandwich.”

“Something the matter with it?” asked Herbert anxiously.

“It’s covered with red spots,” said Atkinson Brown.

“Spots—what kind of spots?”

“Looks like blood,” said Atkinson Brown, giving an uneasy guffaw. “Suppose there hasn’t been a murder in this flat?”

All the guests leaned forward and gazed at the sandwich.

Herbert spoke in a tragic whisper to his mother:

“Mollie’s finger!”

Then he explained the matter airily to the general company.

“Oh, it’s a special kind of sandwich with the gravy outside. A new fad, you know.”

“Oh, I see,” said Atkinson Brown, much relieved. “Hadn’t heard of it. Still, I think I’ll have an ordinary one, if you don’t mind.”

Herbert was muttering little prayers remembered from his childhood.

“Mrs. Hargreaves,” he said cajolingly, “I am sure you play. Won’t you give us a little tune?”

“Well, if it won’t disturb your wife,” said the lady.

“Oh, I am sure it won’t. She’ll love to hear you.”

He felt immensely grateful to this good-natured woman.

“Edward, get my music-roll,” said Mrs. Hargreaves.

But Herbert had a horrible disappointment when Hargreaves said:

“By Jove! I believe I left it in the taxi. Yes, I am sure I did!”

Herbert put his hand up to his aching head and whispered his anguish:

“Oh, my God! Now how shall I mark time?”

“But I reminded you about it!” said Mrs. Hargreaves.

“Yes, I know. But you are always reminding me about something.”

“Well, play something by heart,” said Herbert in a pleading way. “Any old thing. The five-finger exercises.”

“I am very out of practice,” said Mrs. Hargreaves. “But still I will try.”

Herbert breathed a prayer of thankfulness, and hurried to conduct the lady to the music-stool.

As he did so there was a noise outside the window. Newspaper men were shouting their sing-song: “Raid on the ‘Ouse. Suffragette Outrage. Raid on the ‘Ouse of Commins.”

“What are the devils saying?” asked Hargreaves, trying to catch the words.

“Something about the Suffragettes,” growled Atkinson Brown.

“I’m afraid it will give poor Clare a worse headache,” said Mrs. Atkinson Brown.

Mrs. Heywood tried to be reassuring:

“Oh, I don’t think so.”

At that moment there was a loud ring at the bell. The sound was so prolonged that it startled the company.

Herbert listened intently and then whispered to his mother:

“That must be Clare!”

“Oh, if it is only Clare!” said Mrs. Heywood. When Mrs. Hargreaves had struck a few soft chords on the piano there was the sound of voices speaking loudly in the hall. Everybody listened, surprised at the interruption. Mollie’s voice could be heard quite clearly.

“I told you it was our At Home night, Miss Vernon.”

“I can’t help that.”

The drawing-room door opened, sans ceremonie, and Madge Vernon came in. Her face was flushed, and she had sparkling eyes. She stood in the doorway looking at the company with a smile, as though immensely amused by some joke of her own.

“I’m sorry to interrupt you good people,” she said very cheerfully, “but I have come on urgent business, which brooks no delay, as they say in melodrama.”

Mrs. Heywood gazed at her with frightened eyes.

“My dear!... What has happened?”

“What’s the matter?” said Herbert, turning very pale.

“Oh, it’s nothing to be alarmed at,” said Madge Vernon. “It’s about your wife.”

“My wife?”

“About Clare?” exclaimed Mrs. Atkinson Brown.

Mrs. Hargreaves craned her head forward, like a bird reaching for its seed.

“I wonder—” she said.

Madge Vernon grinned at them all.

“It’ll be in the papers to-morrow, so you are all bound to know. Besides, why keep it a secret? It’s a thing to be proud of!”

“Proud of what?” asked Herbert in a frenzied tone of voice.

Madge Vernon enjoyed the drama of her announcement.

“Clare has been arrested in a demonstration outside the House to-night.”

“Arrested!”

The awful word was spoken almost simultaneously by all the company in that drawingroom of Intellectual Mansions, S. W.

“She’s quite safe,” said Madge Vernon calmly. “I’ve come to ask you to bail her out.”

Herbert’s guests rose and looked at him in profound astonishment and indignation.

“But you told us—” cried Mrs. Atkinson Brown.

Herbert Heywood gave a queer groan of anger and horror.

“Bail her out!... Oh, my God!”

He sank down into his chair and held his head in his hands.