come down before him and had probably
laid the envelope on his plate. She was not the woman to ask awkward
questions, but he felt the conjecture of her glance, and he was debating
whether to affect surprise at the receipt of the letter, or to pass it
off as a business communication that had strayed to his house, when a
check fell from the envelope. It was the royalty on the first edition of
the letters. His first feeling was one of simple satisfaction. The
money had come with such infernal opportuneness that he could not help
welcoming it. Before long, too, there would be more; he knew the book
was still selling far beyond the publisher's previsions. He put the
check in his pocket and left the room without looking at his wife.

On the way to his office the habitual reaction set in. The money he had
received was the first tangible reminder that he was living on the
sale of his self-esteem. The thought of material benefit had been
overshadowed by his sense of the intrinsic baseness of making the
letters known; now he saw what an element of sordidness it added to the
situation and how the fact that he needed the money, and must use it,
pledged him more irrevocably than ever to the consequences of his act.
It seemed to him, in that first hour of misery, that he had betrayed his
friend anew.

When, that afternoon, he reached home earlier than usual, Alexa's
drawing-room was full of a gayety that overflowed to the stairs. Flamel,
for a wonder, was not there; but Dresham and young Hartly, grouped about
the tea-table, were receiving with resonant mirth a narrative delivered
in the fluttered staccato that made Mrs. Armiger's conversation like the
ejaculations of a startled aviary.

She paused as Glennard entered, and he had time to notice that his wife,
who was busied about the tea-tray, had not joined in the laughter of the
men.

"Oh, go on, go on," young Hartly rapturously groaned; and Mrs. Armiger
met Glennard's inquiry with the deprecating cry that really she didn't
see what there was to laugh at. "I'm sure I feel more like crying. I
don't know what I should have done if Alexa hadn't been home to give me
a cup of tea. My nerves are in shreds--yes, another, dear, please--" and
as Glennard looked his perplexity, she went on, after pondering on
the selection of a second lump of sugar, "Why, I've just come from the
reading, you know--the reading at the Waldorf."

"I haven't been in town long enough to know anything," said G