y. "After that, there is a wall in my house at Westminster
where it would hang in an admirable light."

The cool insolence of his manner acted like a lighted torch to
gunpowder. Roger swung round upon him furiously, his hands clenched,
his forehead suddenly gnarled with knotted veins.

"By God, Rooke!" he exclaimed. "You go too far! _You_ will exhibit
Nan's portrait . . . _you_ will hang it in your house! . . . And you
think I'll stand by and tolerate such impertinence? Understand . . .
Nan's portrait hangs at Trenby Hall--or nowhere!"

Rooke regarded him apparently unmoved.

"I've yet to learn the law which compels a man to part with his work,"
he remarked indifferently.

Roger took an impetuous step towards him, his clenched hand raised as
though to strike.

"You hound--" he began hoarsely.

Nan rushed between them, catching the upraised hand.

"Roger! . . . Roger!" she cried, her voice shrill with the fear that
in another moment the two men would be at grips.

But he shook off her hand, flinging her aside with such force that she
staggered helplessly backwards.

"As for you," he thundered, his eyes blazing with concentrated anger,
"it's you I've to thank that any man should hold my future wife so
cheap as to imagine he may paint her portrait and then keep it in his
house as though it were his own! . . . But I'm damned if he shall!"

White and shaken, she leaned against the window frame, clutching at the
wood-work for support and staring at him with affrighted eyes as he
turned once more to Rooke.

In his big, brawny strength, doubled by the driving force of anger, he
seemed to tower above the slim, supple figure of the artist, who stood
leaning negligently against the side of the piano, watching him with
narrowed eyes and a faintly supercilious smile on his lips.

"Take your choice, Rooke," he said shortly. "My cheque for five
hundred and get out of this, or--" He paused significantly.

"Or? . . . The other alternative?" murmured Rooke. Roger laughed
roughly, fingering something he held concealed in his hand.

"You'll know that later," he said grimly. "I advise you to close with
the five hundred."

Rooke shook his head.

"Sorry it's impossible. I prefer to keep the picture."

"Oh, Maryon, give in to him! Do give in to him!"

The words came sobbingly from Nan's white lips, and Rooke turned to her
instantly.

"Have I your permission to keep the picture, Nan?" he asked, fixing her