beyond the limits of
speech. Both turned a surprised eye on Glennard and he had the sense of
walking into a room grown suddenly empty, as though their thoughts were
conspirators dispersed by his approach. He felt the clutch of his old
fear. What if his wife had already sorted the papers and had told Flamel
of her discovery? Well, it was no news to Flamel that Glennard was in
receipt of a royalty on the "Aubyn Letters."...

A sudden resolve to know the worst made him lift his eyes to his wife
as the door closed on Flamel. But Alexa had risen also, and bending over
her writing-table, with her back to Glennard, was beginning to speak
precipitately.

"I'm dining out to-night--you don't mind my deserting you? Julia Armiger
sent me word just now that she had an extra ticket for the last Ambrose
concert. She told me to say how sorry she was that she hadn't two--but I
knew YOU wouldn't be sorry!" She ended with a laugh that had the effect
of being a strayed echo of Mrs. Armiger's; and before Glennard could
speak she had added, with her hand on the door, "Mr. Flamel stayed so
late that I've hardly time to dress. The concert begins ridiculously
early, and Julia dines at half-past seven--"

Glennard stood alone in the empty room that seemed somehow full of
an ironical consciousness of what was happening. "She hates me," he
murmured. "She hates me...."

The next day was Sunday, and Glennard purposely lingered late in
his room. When he came downstairs his wife was already seated at the
breakfast-table. She lifted her usual smile to his entrance and they
took shelter in the nearest topic, like wayfarers overtaken by a storm.
While he listened to her account of the concert he began to think that,
after all, she had not yet sorted the papers, and that her agitation of
the previous day must be ascribed to another cause, in which perhaps he
had but an indirect concern. He wondered it had never before occurred to
him that Flamel was the kind of man who might very well please a woman
at his own expense, without need of fortuitous assistance. If this
possibility cleared the outlook it did not brighten it. Glennard merely
felt himself left alone with his baseness.

Alexa left the breakfast-table before him and when he went up to the
drawing-room he found her dressed to go out.

"Aren't you a little early for church?" he asked.

She replied that, on the way there, she meant to stop a moment at
her mother's; and while she drew on he