f he failed to pay the policy would lapse--now
of all times! He had kept it up all these years; it must not lapse now,
for he was going to be right sick. He wanted somebody to nurse him: his
mother--or that long-lost girl he had married in the far past.

His shoes irked him; his vest--what they wanted called his
waistcoat--was as tight as a corset. He felt that he would be safer in
bed. He'd better go up to his own room and stretch out. He rose with
extraordinary difficulty and negotiated a swimming floor on swaying
legs.

The laughter from the dining-room irritated him. He would be better off
up-stairs, where he could not hear it. The noise in his ears was all he
could stand. He attained the foot of the stairs and the flight of steps
seemed as long and as misty as Jacob's Ladder. And he was no angel!

The Grouts lingered at dinner and over their black coffee and tobacco
until it was time to dress for the reception at Mrs. Alvin Mitnick's, at
which Waupoos society would pass itself in review. The later you got
there the smarter you were, and most people put off dressing until the
last possible minute in order to keep themselves from falling asleep
before it was time to start.

The Grouts, however, were eager to go early and get it over with. They
loved to trample on Waupoos traditions. As they drifted into the hall
they found it dark. They shook their heads in dismal recognition of a
familiar phenomenon, and Ethelwolf groaned:

"Pop has gone up-stairs. You can always trace Pop. Wherever he has
passed by the lights are out."

"He has figured out that by darkening the halls while we are at dinner
he saves nearly a cent a day," _Mere_ groaned.

"If Pop were dying he'd turn out a light somewhere because he wouldn't
need it." And Ethelwolf laughed.

But _Mere_ groaned again: "Can you wonder that I get depressed? Now,
children, I ask you--"

"Poor old Mere! It's awful!"--"Ghastly!"--"Maddening!"

They gathered round her lovingly, echoing her moans. They started up the
dark stairway, Consuelo first and turning back to say to Beatrice:

"Pop can cut a penny into more slices than--" Then she screamed and
started back.

Her agitation went down the stairway through the climbing Grouts like a
cold breeze. What was it? She looked close. A hand was just visible on
the floor at the head of the stairs. She had stepped on it.

III

Pop had evidently reached the upper hall, when the ruling passion
burning even through