continued silent, gazing into the library fire, his hands
clenched deep in his trousers pockets, his shoulders squared.

"A beautiful dinner," she continued, her voice rising--"the best I
have had this season, and yet you sat there like a log."

The man turned sharply--so sharply that the woman at his side gave a
start.

"Sit down!" he commanded--"over there where I can see you. I have
something to say."

She looked at him in amazement. The determined ring in his voice made
her half afraid. What had he to say?

"What do you mean?" she retorted.

"Just what I said. Sit down!"

The fair shoulders shrugged. She was accustomed to these outbursts,
but not to this ring in his voice.

"Go on--what is it?"

Thayor crossed the room, shut the door and turned the key in the lock.
She watched him in silence as he switched off the electric lights
along the bookcases, until naught illumined the still library but the
soft glow of the lamp and the desultory flare from the hearth.

Still he did not speak. Finally the storm broke.

"What I have to say to you is this: I'm sick of this wholesale giving
of dinners."

Alice let go her breath. After all, it was not what was uppermost in
her mind.

"Ah! So that's it," she returned.

"That's a part of it," he cried, "but not all."

"And the other part?" she asked, her nervousness returning.

"I'll come to that later," said her husband, with an accent on the
last word. "It is necessary that I should begin at the beginning."

"Go on," she murmured nervously, gazing absently into the fire, her
mind at work, her fears suddenly aroused. For the first time its
wavering light seemed restful. "Go on--I'm listening."

"The first part is that I'm sick of these dinners. I've told you so
before, and yet you had the impertinence to-night to give another and
not say a word to me about it." The voice had a cold, incisive note in
it--the touch of steel to warm flesh.

"Impertinence! Your ideas of hospitality, Sam, are peculiar." Any
topic was better than the one she feared.

"Hospitality!" he retorted hotly. "Do you call it hospitality to
squander my money on the cheap spongers you are continually inviting
here? Do you call it hospitable to force me to sit up and entertain
this riff-raff night after night, and then be dragged off to the opera
or theatre when I am played out after a hard day's work down town for
the money you spend? And just look at Margaret! Do you suppose that
these