As he sat in the office, the grip of characterization settled upon him. Oddments and gleams of past conversations in the “Infirmary” came back to him, and he embodied them. Stroke by stroke there grew up under his hand a portrait, crude from haste but vivid, telling, and a stimulant to mirth, not always of the kindliest. It was not intentionally unfair; it was never malicious in purpose. But it was the more deadly in effect. By the magic transformation of print it made out of an unpolished, simple, generous, fervent, and thoughtful artisan, a laughable homunculus. Yet there was in it no element of “fake.” Jeremy could have defended it at all points. Any newspaper judgment would have credited it with due fidelity to facts. The sum-total was a subtle and gross misrepresentation. Had the writer read it over he would perhaps have seen this for himself. But there was no time. He barely caught the edition. Wackley’s: “Great stuff, my boy! You’ll hear of this,” happily distracted him from the stirrings of a conscience which faintly wished to know how Eli Wade would take it. “You’re doing golf to-morrow,” continued the managing editor. “Don’t bother to come to the office first.” Profiting by this, Jeremy, an hour before match time, called at Miss Pritchard’s for Marcia. He was informed that she had left on an errand, but would meet him at the Country Club. When, just before the first pair teed up, she appeared, her mentor was startled, she looked so wan and languid. “Good Heavens!” said Jeremy in a whisper. “You have n’t let this thing get on your nerves?” She shook her head. Her eyes did not avoid his now; but the changeful lights seemed to have dwindled to the merest flicker in inscrutable depths. “Let me get you a cup of coffee. That’ll brace you up.” “I shall be all right,” she said with an effort.