The next afternoon she sat waiting for Joe. She had come home the night before feeling so strong and sure of her course. But beginning at the moment when she came into the empty apartment, subtly and by slow degrees again her home had cast its spell, as though the rooms were haunted. "I've got to lay the ghost," she thought. She had telephoned to Joe to come, and he had replied abruptly, "All right, I'll be there about four o'clock." It was just that now. Ethel poked the logs in the fireplace until there was a cheerful blaze. As she straightened up she caught sight of her face in the mirror over the mantel. Even in the firelight how gaunt and strained it looked to her. "Not very attractive," she grimly thought. "This has got to be done by brains, my dear." In a moment she heard Joe's key in the door. She heard him taking off his coat and then coming slowly into the room. With an effort she turned and looked at him. His face appeared even more tense and grey than it had two days before; the nerves seemed quivering under the skin. And she felt a pang of pity. "He wasn't to blame for the way he acted, it was his wretched nerves," she thought. "He'll have a break-down after this." "Well, Ethel!" "Oh, Joe, I'm so glad you're here." All at once she felt herself change. She had meant to be so firm with him; but now, after one quick anxious look, in a low eager voice she said, "I'm not going to talk much of myself. It won't do any good--I'm sure it won't. I love you, Joe, and I can see you still love me. We need each other. And if we can just be sensible now--and you can only believe in me--" "God knows I want to, Ethel!" His tone was low, but so sharp and tense that she drew suddenly closer. He turned from her and sank into a chair, with his hands for a moment pressed to his eyes. "I'm sick of this--I'm not myself. Maybe I acted like a fool. . . . Some of that stuff from Fanny Carr doesn't hold together--it's too thin." He looked up at her. "But some of it does. And what you'll have to clear up now is why you never let me know." "The reason I didn't," she answered quickly, "goes way back into the past. And it's not only about you and me--it's about--about somebody else." She stopped and her throat contracted. She set her teeth. "We must talk about Amy for a while." There! At last she had brought it out! And she had seen her husband flinch. For a moment both were silent. "Why!" he asked. She swallowed hard. "Because we never have before. We've--gone two years without speaking her name. I had no idea how bad that might be." She broke off, for her voice was trembling so. "I don't know how much you've learned in that time--about Amy, I mean--but I've learned a lot, and--I think I'd better tell you. I must, you see, or you won't understand what I've been doing lately. I couldn't have explained before, without speaking of her--and I didn't do that. But I should have, Joe, and I will now--if only you'll be patient and let me do the talking."