'

'How can we look forward at all?' replied Amy. 'It has come to the
question of how we are to subsist. I thought you would rather get money
in this way than borrow of mother--when she has the expense of keeping
me and Willie.'

'You are right,' muttered Reardon. 'Do as you think best.' Amy was in
her most practical mood, and would not linger for purposeless talk. A
few minutes, and Reardon was left alone.

He stood before his bookshelves and began to pick out the volumes which
he would take away with him. Just a few, the indispensable companions of
a bookish man who still clings to life--his Homer, his Shakespeare--

The rest must be sold. He would get rid of them to-morrow morning. All
together they might bring him a couple of sovereigns.

Then his clothing. Amy had fulfilled all the domestic duties of a wife;
his wardrobe was in as good a state as circumstances allowed. But there
was no object in burdening himself with winter garments, for, if he
lived through the summer at all, he would be able to repurchase such few
poor things as were needful; at present he could only think of how to
get together a few coins. So he made a heap of such things as might be
sold.

The furniture? If it must go, the price could scarcely be more than ten
or twelve pounds; well, perhaps fifteen. To be sure, in this way his
summer's living would be abundantly provided for.

He thought of Biffen enviously. Biffen, if need be, could support life
on three or four shillings a week, happy in the thought that no mortal
had a claim upon him. If he starved to death--well, many another lonely
man has come to that end. If he preferred to kill himself, who would be
distressed? Spoilt child of fortune!

The bells of St Marylebone began to clang for afternoon service. In
the idleness of dull pain his thoughts followed their summons, and he
marvelled that there were people who could imagine it a duty or find it
a solace to go and sit in that twilight church and listen to the droning
of prayers. He thought of the wretched millions of mankind to whom life
is so barren that they must needs believe in a recompense beyond the
grave. For that he neither looked nor longed. The bitterness of his
lot was that this world might be a sufficing paradise to him if only he
could clutch a poor little share of current coin. He had won the world's
greatest prize--a woman's love--but could not retain it because his
pockets were empty.

That he should fail to m