pper, unless you
like. Let me come and sit in your rooms with you."

"No!" he decided, almost roughly. "I am losing myself, Sophy. I am
losing something of my strength every day. Louise doesn't help as she
might. Don't stay with me, please. I am beginning to have moods, and
when they come on I want to be alone."

She drew a little closer to him.

"Let me come, please!" she begged, with a pathetic, almost childlike
quiver at the corner of her lips.

He looked down at her. A sudden wave of tenderness swept every other
thought from his mind. His mental balance seemed suddenly restored. He
hailed a passing taxi and handed Sophy into it.

"What a selfish pig I am!" he exclaimed. "Anyhow, it's all over now.
We'll go back to Luigi's to supper, by all means. I am going to make you
tell me all about that young man from Bath!"

XXVII

Louise glanced at her watch, sat up in bed, and turned reproachfully
toward Aline.

"Aline, do you know it is only eleven o'clock?" she exclaimed.

"I am very sorry, _madame_," the latter hastened to explain, "but there
is a gentleman down-stairs who wishes to see you. He says he will wait
until you can receive him. I thought you would like to know."

"A gentleman at this hour of the morning?" Louise yawned. "How absurd!
Anyhow, you ought to know better than to wake me up before the proper
time."

"I am very sorry, _madame_," Aline replied. "I hesitated for some time,
but I thought you would like to know that the gentleman was here. It is
Mr. Stephen Strangewey--Mr. John's brother."

Louise clasped her knees with her fingers and sat thinking. She was wide
awake now.

"He has been here some time already, _madame_," Aline continued. "I did
not wish to disturb you, but I thought perhaps it was better for you to
know that he was here."

"Quite right, Aline," Louise decided. "Go down and tell him that I will
see him in half an hour, and get my bath ready at once."

Louise dressed herself simply but carefully. She could conceive of but
one reason for Stephen's presence in her house, and it rather amused
her. It was, of course, no friendly visit. He had come either to
threaten or to cajole. Yet what could he do? What had she to fear? She
went over the interview in her mind, imagining him crushed and subdued
by her superior subtlety and finesse.

With a little smile of coming triumph upon her lips she descended the
stairs and swept into her pleas