a poor show of it. The figures danced about before him; he
could make neither head nor tail of the technicalities in the
specifications and estimates; every now and then fits of abstraction
came over him, and he sat drumming the tips of his fingers on his
blotting-pad, staring vacantly at the shadows in the far depths of the
room, and always thinking--thinking of the terrible danger of
revelation. And always, as an under-current, he was saying that for
himself he cared naught--Kitely could do what he liked, or would have
done what he liked, had there only been himself to think for.
But--Lettie! All his life was now centred in her, and in her happiness,
and Lettie's happiness, he knew, was centred in the man she was going to
marry. And Cotherstone, though he believed that he knew men pretty well,
was not sure that he knew Windle Bent sufficiently to feel sure that he
would endure a stiff test. Bent was ambitious--he was resolved on a
career. Was he the sort of man to stand the knowledge which Kitely might
give him? For there was always the risk that whatever he and Mallalieu
might do, Kitely, while there was breath in him, might split.

A sudden ringing at the bell of the telephone in the outer office made
Cotherstone jump in his chair as if the arresting hand of justice had
suddenly been laid on him. In spite of himself he rose trembling, and
there were beads of perspiration on his forehead as he walked across the
room.

"Nerves!" he muttered to himself. "I must be in a queer way to be taken
like that. It won't do!--especially at this turn. What is it?" he
demanded, going to the telephone. "Who is that?"

His daughter's voice, surprised and admonitory, came to him along the
wire.

"Is that you, father?" she exclaimed. "What are you doing? Don't you
remember you asked Windle, and his friend Mr. Brereton, to supper at
eight o'clock. It's a quarter to eight now. Do come home!"

Cotherstone let out an exclamation which signified annoyance. The event
of the late afternoon had completely driven it out of his recollection
that Windle Bent had an old school-friend, a young barrister from
London, staying with him, and that both had been asked to supper that
evening at Cotherstone's house. But Cotherstone's annoyance was not
because of his own forgetfulness, but because his present abstraction
made him dislike the notion of company.

"I'd forgotten--for the moment," he called. "I've been very busy. All
right, Lettie--I'm c