afford, and
animal-like hatred was the dominating note of his face and carriage.

"Come with me, Stafford: I want to speak to you," he said, hoarsely.
"You've arrived when I wanted you--at the exact time."

"Yes, I said I would come at eleven," responded Stafford, mechanically.
"Jasmine expects me at eleven."

"In here," Byng said, pointing to a little morning-room.

As Stafford entered, he saw Krool's face, malign and sombre, show in a
doorway of the hall. Was he mistaken in thinking that Krool flashed a
look of secret triumph and yet of obscure warning? Warning? There was
trouble, strange and dreadful trouble, here; and the wrenching thought
had swept into his brain that he was the cause of it all, that he was
to be the spring and centre of dreadful happenings.

He was conscious of something else purely objective as he entered the
room--of music, the music of a gay light opera being played in the
adjoining room, from which this little morning-room was separated only
by Indian bead-curtains. He saw idle sunlight play upon these beads, as
he sat down at the table to which Rudyard motioned him. He was also
subconsciously aware who it was that played the piano beyond there with
such pleasant skill. Many a time thereafter, in the days to come, he
would be awakened in the night by the sound of that music, a love-song
from the light opera "A Lady of London," which had just caught the ears
of the people in the street.

Of one thing he was sure: the end of things had come--the end of all
things that life meant to him had come. Rudyard knew! Rudyard, sitting
there at the other side of the table and leaning toward him with a face
where, in control of all else, were hate and panic emotion--he knew.

The music in the next room was soft, persistent and searching. As Ian
waited for Rudyard to speak he was conscious that even the words of the
silly, futile love-song:

"Not like the roses shall our love be, dear
Never shall its lovely petals fade,
Singing, it will flourish till the world's last year
Happy as the song-birds in the glade."

Through it all now came Rudyard's voice.

"I have a letter here," the voice said, and he saw Rudyard slowly take
it from his pocket. "I want you to read it, and when you have read it,
I want you to tell me what you think of the man who wrote it."

He threw a letter down on the table--a square white envelope with the
crest of the Trafalgar Club upon it. It lay face downward, waiti