re unpleasant that's just as well, too. The
fact that people know what to expect kills more talk later. I suppose
she'll manage a fairly quiet divorce."

"Won't listen to it," George snapped.

"How stupid of me!" Wandel drawled. "Of course she wouldn't."

He sighed.

"I mean to sympathize with you, my George, but all the time I envy you,
and have to restrain myself from offering congratulations. Behold the
oysters! They're really very good here."

George tried to smile.

"Then shall we talk about shell fish?"

"Bivalves, George. Or we might discuss the great strike. Which one? Take
your choice. Or, by the way, have you received your shock yet? They're
raising rents in our house more than a hundred per cent."

"The hell after war!" George grinned.

Wandel smiled back.

"Let us hope not a milestone on the road."

XXIV

Through pure will George resumed his routine, but it no longer had the
power to capture him, becoming a drudgery without a clear purpose.
Always he was conscious of the effort to force himself from recollection
and imagination, to drive Sylvia from his mind; and, even so, he never
quite succeeded. Were there then no heights beyond?

Lambert was painstakingly considerate, catching him for luncheon from
time to time, or calling at unexpected moments at his office, and always
he said something about Sylvia. She was well. Naturally she was keeping
to herself. Betty and she were at Princeton, and Sylvia was going to
stay on with the Alstons for a time. Once he let slip a sincere
admiration, a real regret.

"It's extraordinary, George. You've very nearly made every word good."

George took the opening to ask a question that had been in his mind for
many days.

"Where is he? What's he up to? I haven't seen him, but, naturally, I
keep to myself, too, and Dicky, bless him, mentions nothing."

Lambert frowned.

"He hasn't been around the office much since. He's taking his own sweet
will with himself now. He's gone away--to Canada. It's cold there, but
it's also fairly wet."

"If one could only be sure he had the virtue of loving her!" George
mused.

"He hasn't," Lambert said, impatiently. "Since I talked with him that
hectic night I've admitted that Dolly's never had the capacity to love
any one except himself. So he's probably happy in his own unpleasant
way."

A thought came to George. He smiled a little.

"I've been wondering if Sylvia is going in harder than ever on the side
of th