years. Was there
never a time, when you were younger, when you were my age, when you felt
differently toward women?"

"Never, thank Heaven!" Stephen replied. "I was too near the sorrow that
fell upon our house when our father died with a broken heart. There were
the other two as well--one with a bullet in his brain, the other a
drunkard. Maybe, when I was your age, I felt at times what I suppose you
feel. Well, I just took it in both hands and strangled it. If you must
have a sweetheart, why don't you take the little fair-haired
girl--Sophy, you called her? She'd do you as little harm as any of
them."

"Because it is not a sweetheart of that sort I want," John protested
vigorously. "I've had the same feelings as most men, I suppose, but I've
fought my battle out to the end, only for a different reason. I want a
wife and I want children."

"Will she bring you children, that woman?" Stephen asked bitterly.

"I hope so," John asserted simply. "I believe so."

There was a moment's silence. Stephen lit his pipe and puffed steadily
at it, his eyes fixed upon the log that blazed on the hearth.

"There is a muzzle upon my mouth," he said presently. "There are words
close to my lips which would part you and me, so I'll say no more. Go
your own way, John. I'll ask you but one more question, and you must
take that as man from man, brother from brother. How old is she?"

"Twenty-seven."

"And she has been an actress, playing parts like the one I saw her in,
for how long?"

"Since she was nineteen," John replied.

"And you believe she's a good woman?"

John gripped at the sides of his chair. With a tremendous effort he kept
the torrent of words from his lips.

"I know she is," he answered calmly.

"Has she told you so?"

"A man has no need to put such a question to the woman he cares for."

"Then you haven't asked her?"

John laid down his pipe and rose to his feet. He gripped his brother by
the arm.

"Stephen," he said, "it's a hard fight for me, this, to sit face to face
with you and know what you are thinking, with the love for this woman
strong and sweet in my heart. You don't understand, Stephen; you're a
long way from understanding. But you are my brother. Don't make it too
hard! I am not a child. Believe in me. I would not take any woman to be
my wife, and the mother of my children, who was not a good woman. I am
off to-morrow morning, Stephen. I came all the way just on an impulse,
because I felt that