alf an hour ago. Apoplexy! If your relations are all as
beautiful as that!"

But Griggs was already moving towards the staircase. The cobbler called
him back, and he stood still at the foot of the steps.

"There is the little apartment on the left, on the third floor," said
the man. "The lodgers went away yesterday. I was going to ask you to
write me a notice to put up on the door. As for paying, the padrone will
not mind, seeing that you are an old lodger. It is good, do you know?
There is sun. There is also a kitchen. There are five rooms with the
entry."

[Illustration: "The horror of poverty smote him."--Vol. II., p. 123.]

"I will take it," said Griggs, instantly, and he ran up the stairs.

He was breathless with anxiety as he entered his work-room, and looked
about him for something which should tell him where Gloria was gone.
Almost instantly his eyes fell upon a sheet of paper lying before his
accustomed seat. The writing on it was hers.

"I have gone to tell him. I shall be back soon."

That was all it said, but it was enough to blacken the sun that streamed
through the windows upon the old carpet. Griggs sat down and rested his
head in his hand. With the cloud that came between him and happiness,
his powers of reason returned, and he saw quickly, in the pre-vision of
logic, a scene of violence and anger between husband and wife, a
possible reconciliation, and the instant wreck of his storm-driven love.
It was impossible to know what Gloria would tell Reanda.

At the same instant the difficulties of his position rushed upon him and
demanded an instant solution. He looked about him at the poor room, the
miserable furniture, and the worn-out carpet, and the horror of poverty
smote him in the face. He had allowed Gloria to come to him, and he knew
that he could not support her decently. He had never found himself in
so desperate a position in the course of his short and adventurous life.
He could face anything when he alone was to suffer privation, but it was
horrible to force misery upon the woman he loved.

Then, too, he asked himself what was to happen to Gloria if Reanda
killed him, as was possible enough. And if he were not killed, there was
Dalrymple, her father, who might return at any moment. No one could
foretell what the Scotchman would do. It would be like him to do nothing
except to refuse ever to see his daughter again. But he, also, might
choose to fight, though his English traditions would