he rose with a sigh, and, though it was growing dark, he began to
draw aimlessly, and Rainsford, when he came in, found Tony sketching,
and the young man said--

"You don't give a fellow much of your company these days, Peter. Have a
cigarette? I've smoked a whole box myself."

"I'm glad to see you working, Fairfax."

"You don't know how glad I am," Fairfax exclaimed; "but the light's
bad."

Putting aside his drawing-board, he turned to his friend, and, with an
ardour such as he had not displayed since the old days at the Delavan,
began to tell of his conception.

"I have given up my idea of a single figure. I shall make a bas-relief,
a great circular tablet, if you understand, a wall with curving sides,
and emblematic figures in high relief. It will be a mighty fine piece of
work, Rainsford, if it's ever done."

"What will your figures be, Tony?"

"Ah, they won't let me see their forms or faces yet." He changed the
subject. "What have you done with your Sunday, old man? Slept all day?"

"No, I've been sitting for an hour or two with Mrs. Fairfax."

Molly's husband murmured, "I'm a brute, and no one knows it better than
I do."

Rainsford made no refutation of his friend's accusation of himself, but
suggested--

"She might bring her sewing in the afternoons, Tony; it would be less
lonely for her?"

Fairfax noticed the flush that rose along the agent's thin cheek.

"By Jove!" Fairfax reflected. "I wonder if old Rainsford is in love with
Molly?" The supposition did not make him jealous.

The two men went home together, and Rainsford stayed to supper as he had
taken a habit of doing, for Fairfax did not wish to be alone. But when
at ten o'clock the guest had gone and the engineer and his wife were
alone together in their homely room, Fairfax said--

"Don't judge me too harshly, Molly."

Judge him? Did he think she did?

"You might well, my dear."

He took the hand that did all the work for his life and home and which
she tried to keep as "ladylike" as she knew, and said, his eyes full on
her--

"I do the best I can. I'm an artist, that's the truth of it! There's
something in me that's stronger than anything else in the world. I
reckon it's talent. I don't know how good it is or how ignoble; but it's
brutal, and I've got to satisfy it, Molly."

Didn't she know it, didn't Mr. Rainsford tell her? Didn't she want to
leave him free?

"You're the best girl in the world!" he cried contritely, and check