ly in the evening, and the usual company had not yet
arrived. Harding stood on the white fur hearthrug, his legs slightly
apart, smoking. Mike lay in an easy-chair. His eyes were upon
Harding, whom he had not seen for some years, and the sight of him
recalled the years when they wrote the _Pilgrim_ together.

He thought how splendid were then his enthusiasms and how genuine his
delight in life. It was in this very room that he kissed Lily for the
first time. That happy day. Well did he remember how the sun shone
upon the great river, how the hay-boats sailed, how the city rose
like a vision out of the mist. But Lily lies asleep, far away in a
southern land; she lies sleeping, facing Italy--that Italy which they
should have seen and dreamed together. At that moment, he brushed
from his book a little green insect that had come out of the night,
and it disappeared in faint dust.

It was in this room he had seen Lady Helen for the last time; and he
remembered how, when he returned to her, after having taken Lily back
to the dancing-room, he had found her reading a letter, and almost
the very words of the conversation it had given rise to came back to
him, and her almost aggressive despair. No one could say why she had
shot herself. Who was the man that had deserted her? What was he
like? Was it Harding? It was certainly for a lover who had tired of
her; and Mike wondered how it were possible to weary of one so
beautiful and so interesting, and he believed that if she had loved
him they both would have found content.

"Do you remember, Harding, that it was in this room we saw Lady Helen
alive for the last time? What a tragedy that was! Do you remember the
room in the Alexandra Hotel, the firelight, with the summer morning
coming through the Venetian blinds? Somehow there was a sense of
sculpture, even without the beautiful body. Seven years have passed.
She has enjoyed seven years of peace and rest; we have endured seven
years of fret and worry. Life of course was never worth living, but
the common stupidity of the nineteenth century renders existence for
those who may see into the heart of things almost unbearable. I
confess that every day man's stupidity seems to me more and more
miraculous. Indeed it may be said to be divine, so inherent and so
unalterable is it; and to understand it we need not stray from the
question in hand--suicide. A man is houseless, he is old, he is
friendless, he is starving, he is assailed in