done in your life. Man
alive, you're----'

Torpenhow turned to his companions appealingly, and they left the room
to find lunch elsewhere. Then he spoke; but, since the reproof of a
friend is much too sacred and intimate a thing to be printed, and since
Torpenhow used figures and metaphors which were unseemly, and contempt
untranslatable, it will never be known what was actually said to Dick,
who blinked and winked and picked at his hands. After a time the culprit
began to feel the need of a little self-respect. He was quite sure that
he had not in any way departed from virtue, and there were reasons, too,
of which Torpenhow knew nothing. He would explain.

He rose, tried to straighten his shoulders, and spoke to the face he
could hardly see.

'You are right,' he said. 'But I am right, too. After you went away I
had some trouble with my eyes. So I went to an oculist, and he turned a
gasogene--I mean a gas-engine--into my eye. That was very long ago. He
said, "Scar on the head,--sword-cut and optic nerve." Make a note of
that. So I am going blind. I have some work to do before I go blind, and
I suppose that I must do it. I cannot see much now, but I can see best
when I am drunk. I did not know I was drunk till I was told, but I must
go on with my work. If you want to see it, there it is.' He pointed to
the all but finished Melancolia and looked for applause.

Torpenhow said nothing, and Dick began to whimper feebly, for joy at
seeing Torpenhow again, for grief at misdeeds--if indeed they were
misdeeds--that made Torpenhow remote and unsympathetic, and for childish
vanity hurt, since Torpenhow had not given a word of praise to his
wonderful picture.

Bessie looked through the keyhole after a long pause, and saw the two
walking up and down as usual, Torpenhow's hand on Dick's shoulder.

Hereat she said something so improper that it shocked even Binkie,
who was dribbling patiently on the landing with the hope of seeing his
master again.

CHAPTER XI

The lark will make her hymn to God,
The partridge call her brood,
While I forget the heath I trod,
The fields wherein I stood.

'Tis dule to know not night from morn,
But deeper dule to know
I can but hear the hunter's horn
That once I used to blow.

--The Only Son.

IT WAS the third day after Torpenhow's return, and his heart was heavy.

'Do you mean to tell me that you can't see to work without whiskey? It's