s true, sir, that at that time my property was
encumbered, but it was not unproductive. She died long ago. I have
reason to believe that her married life was not happy. I was hot-blooded
in those days, and my honor was touched, but I never blamed her. She
was, at twenty, the most beautiful woman in Virginia. I have never seen
her equal."

This was more than the Major had ever revealed about his private life
before. He had created an illusion about himself which society accepted,
and in which he lived in apparent enjoyment of metropolitan existence.
This was due to a sanguine temperament and a large imagination. And
he had one quality that made him a favorite--a hearty enjoyment of
the prosperity of others. With regard to himself, his imagination was
creative, and Jack could not now tell whether this "most beautiful woman
of Virginia" was not evoked by the third glass, about which the Major
remarked, as he emptied it, that only this extraordinary occasion could
justify such an indulgence at this time of day.

The courtly old gentleman had inquired about madam--indeed, the second
glass had been dedicated to "mother and child"--and he exhibited a
friendly and almost paternal interest, as he always did, in Jack.

"By-the-way," he said, after a silence, "is Henderson in town?"

"I haven't heard. Why?"

"There's been a good deal of uneasiness in the Street as to what he is
doing. I hope you haven't got anything depending on him."

"I've got something in his stocks, if that is what you mean; but I don't
mind telling you I have made something."

"Well, it's none of my business, only the Henderson stocks have gone off
a little, as you know."

Jack knew, and he asked the Major a little nervously if he knew anything
further. The Major knew nothing except Street rumors. Jack was uneasy,
for the Major was a sort of weathercock, and before he left the club he
wrote to Mavick.

He carried home with him a certain disquiet, to which he had been for
months a stranger. Even the sight of Edith, who met him with a happy
face, and dragged him away at once to see how lovely the baby looked
asleep, could not remove this. It seemed strange that such a little
thing should make a change, introduce an alien element into this
domestic peace. Jack was like some other men who lose heart not
when they are doing a doubtful thing, but when they have to face the
consequences--cases of misplaced conscience. The peace and content that
he had lef