n of entertaining for each other all the affection of
a happily married couple. But in their own home they lived continuously
in a state of mutual aversion and estrangement, occupying separate
apartments and holding only the most formal communications with each
other.

The house which they occupied was a stately stucco structure, situated
on top of a terraced lawn and approached by a gravel walk banked with
flowers and shrubs. A sloping roof, painted a dull red and pierced by a
huge chimney, gave a warm and picturesque tone to the place, which
otherwise might have appeared coldly severe and uninviting.

The luxurious seclusion which the Collinses enjoyed was shared by about
sixty neighbors who formed the wealthy colony of Delmore Park, a small
suburb within easy motoring and commuting distance of New York. The park
itself was an attractive inclosure of some three hundred acres,
surrounded by a fence of high iron palings and laid out so as to give
the impression from within of a natural forest, while, as a matter of
fact, the place was a triumph of the consummate skill of expert
gardeners. In this deliberately fashioned woodland it was possible to
combine all the pomp and extravagance of city life with the rustic
attractiveness and simplicity of the country--a combination toward which
the wealthy are turning in increasing numbers each year.

On the morning following Whitmore's strange nocturnal excursion,
Collins's alarm clock set up an ear-splitting din at a most unwonted
hour. On retiring the previous night Collins had set the alarm for
seven-thirty, an hour at which he usually attained his deepest sleep.
Only on rare occasions was he known to retire before two A. M.,
and still rarer were the occasions when he relinquished his bed before
eleven.

A product of the gay night life of the city, he required the mornings
for slumber. Nor did he on this particular morning rouse himself into
immediate activity. Stretching himself languorously, he permitted the
alarm to exhaust itself, then buried his head in his pillow.

But he did not close his eyes. With a painful effort he prevented his
tired eyelids from falling and for half an hour remained stretched
between the sheets, lost in gloomy reflection.

There had been a purpose in setting the alarm at this early hour; the
same purpose now held him awake, absorbed in thought, yet alert to every
sound about the house. He heard the butler unlock the storm doors and
the serv