urred to me. He and Louise
have known each other for such a long time, and I wondered what he might
have to say about it."

John laid his hands upon the poisonous thoughts that had stolen once
more into his blood, and told himself that he had strangled them. He
swept them away and glanced at his watch.

"Let's have some dinner before I change, down in the grill-room--in a
quarter of an hour's time, say. I don't want to be at the theater before
the second act."

Sophy hesitated. There was a hard feeling in her throat, a burning at
the back of her eyes. She was passionately anxious to be alone, yet she
could not bring herself to refuse. She could not deny herself, or tear
herself at once away from the close companionship which seemed, somehow
or other, to have crept up between herself and John, and to have become
the one thing that counted in life.

"I'd love to," she said, "but remember I've been traveling. Look at me!
I must either go home, or you must let me go into your room--"

"Make yourself at home," John invited. "I have three letters to write,
and some telephone messages to answer."

Sophy lit another cigarette and strolled jauntily through his suite of
rooms. When she was quite sure that she was alone, however, she closed
the door behind her, dropped her cigarette, and staggered to the window.
She stood there, gazing down into an alleyway six stories below, where
the people passing back and forth looked like dwarf creatures.

One little movement forward! No one could have been meant to bear pain
like this. She set her teeth.

"It would be so soon over!"

Then she suddenly found that she could see nothing; the people below
were blurred images. A rush of relief had come to her. She sank into the
nearest chair and sobbed.

XXXIII

The reception in honor of the little company of French tragedians, at
which almost the whole of the English stage and a sprinkling of society
people were present, was a complete success. Louise made a charming
hostess, and Sir Edward more than ever justified his reputation for
saying the right thing to the right person at the right moment. The
rooms were crowded with throngs of distinguished people, who all seemed
to have plenty to say to one another.

The only person, perhaps, who found himself curiously ill at ease was
John. He heard nothing but French on all sides of him--a language which
he read with some facility, but which he s