ry's?"

"A loan, yes. A friend--only as your friends are mine."

"It's too bad, a burning shame--when Harry works so hard, too." The girl
winked fast, against her will. "I can't quite forgive Margery."

"For going to Chicago?"

"For everything. For that too."

"Not if I told you I advised her to go?"

"You!" In astonishment complete the girl stared. "You advised her to
go?"

"Yes, the same day I made Randall the loan. It was really a coincidence.
I wondered they didn't meet in the elevator."

"A lawyer in a little town like this, with several departments in his
business, comes in contact with a variety of things," he commented after
a moment.

"Tell me about Margery." The girl seemed to have heard that suggestion
only. "I can't understand, can't believe--really."

For a moment Roberts was silent. There was no banter in his manner when
he looked up at last.

"I didn't tell you this merely to gossip," he said slowly; "I think you
appreciate that without my saying it; but somehow I felt that you ought
to know--that if any one could do any good there it is you. I never met
either of them before, that's another coincidence; but from what you've
told me and the little I saw of them both that day, I felt dead sorry.
Besides, life's so short, and I hate--divorce."

"You can't mean it has come to that?"

"It hadn't come, but it was coming fast. She visited me first. From
there she was going straight to her father--to stay."

"It's horrible, simply horrible--and so unjustified! You induced her,
though, to go to Chicago instead?"

"It was a compromise, a play for time. I tried to get her to go back
home, but she refused, positively. The only alternative seemed to be to
get her away--quick.... Was I right?"

"Yes, I think so, under the circumstances. But the trouble itself, I
can't understand yet--Was it that abominable furniture?"

"Partly. At least that was the final straw, the match to the fuse. The
whole thing had been gathering slowly for a long time. I didn't get the
entire story, of course. She wasn't exactly coherent. It seems she
ordered it on her own responsibility, and when the goods were
delivered--the thing was merely inevitable, some time--that was all."

"Inevitable? No. It was abominable of Margery--unforgivable."

"I don't know about that; in fact I'm inclined to differ. I still
maintain it was inevitable."

"Inevitable fiddlesticks! Harry is the best-natured man alive, and
generous. He's