t to ascend to his room. Upstairs, he and his companion
had the long dimly-lit corridor to themselves, and Sophy paused on her
threshold, gathering up in one hand the pale folds of her cloak, while
she held the other out to Darrow.

"If the telegram comes early I shall be off by the first train; so I
suppose this is good-bye," she said, her eyes dimmed by a little shadow
of regret.

Darrow, with a renewed start of contrition, perceived that he had again
forgotten her letter; and as their hands met he vowed to himself that
the moment she had left him he would dash down stairs to post it.

"Oh, I'll see you in the morning, of course!"

A tremor of pleasure crossed her face as he stood before her, smiling a
little uncertainly.

"At any rate," she said, "I want to thank you now for my good day."

He felt in her hand the same tremor he had seen in her face. "But it's
YOU, on the contrary--" he began, lifting the hand to his lips.

As he dropped it, and their eyes met, something passed through hers that
was like a light carried rapidly behind a curtained window.

"Good night; you must be awfully tired," he said with a friendly
abruptness, turning away without even waiting to see her pass into her
room. He unlocked his door, and stumbling over the threshold groped in
the darkness for the electric button. The light showed him a telegram on
the table, and he forgot everything else as he caught it up.

"No letter from France," the message read.

It fell from Darrow's hand to the floor, and he dropped into a chair
by the table and sat gazing at the dingy drab and olive pattern of
the carpet. She had not written, then; she had not written, and it
was manifest now that she did not mean to write. If she had had any
intention of explaining her telegram she would certainly, within
twenty-four hours, have followed it up by a letter. But she evidently
did not intend to explain it, and her silence could mean only that she
had no explanation to give, or else that she was too indifferent to be
aware that one was needed.

Darrow, face to face with these alternatives, felt a recrudescence of
boyish misery. It was no longer his hurt vanity that cried out. He told
himself that he could have borne an equal amount of pain, if only it had
left Mrs. Leath's image untouched; but he could not bear to think of her
as trivial or insincere. The thought was so intolerable that he felt a
blind desire to punish some one else for the pain it cau