“A man’s impelling motive is not always under his own hat,” he overheard some one saying as they passed him, and he applied the words to himself; and when he remembered the ruthless extravagance which no words or entreaties of his own could stay, and which alone (so he believed) had forced him into knavery, he felt that social death was a poor requital to the woman who had worked his ruin. A knife was more her due. And yet, and yet, she was such a monstrous fine woman, and so thoroughly clever in the _rôle_ she had set herself to play. It certainly was a gorgeous assembly. Not made up exclusively of the very best people perhaps, though many of them were there; but it looked wealth unspeakable. Men in evening dress cannot show this; if they fail to appear like waiters, that is the utmost they can expect. But the women! They carried it on their shoulders and backs, as they have done since the beginning of time. Their dresses were a dream of cost and loveliness, their jewelery a chain of rainbows. “Oh, Lord,” said one young man with predatory instincts, who propped a wall, “why aren’t I a practising bushranger just now? There’s some of the finest diamonds in all the world here to-night, and two Johnnies with pistols could stick up the whole house. Why’s England such a beastly safe place? If there was a hard, wooden chair anywhere here to sit on and think, I believe I’d turn anarchist on the spot.” “Don’t reduce the crowd to L. S. D.,” said a fellow prop. “It spoils the poetry of the thing. Now, I find them good enough to look at.” “Never said they weren’t,” rejoined the other. “Only thing is they aren’t mine. Now, I could do very well with the lot of them.” “This isn’t Turkey,” said his friend, reprovingly. “Oh, not the women. I’ve got one wife, and she’s enough for me. But I’d like the dresses and the diamonds. I’d sell ’em second-hand to the Jews, and riot on the proceeds. Talking of sales, come and find some burgundy cup.” They went away from the ballroom, passing down the broad, shallow stairway, and were going to cross the hall, when a man stopped them and told them the way was closed. “What’s the matter? Has there been an accident?” “Well, perhaps it might be an accident, sir. ’Tisn’t for me to say.” “Who the devil are you, anyway?” “A member of the metropolitan police force, sir; a plain-clothes man, at your service. Stand back, sir, I say. You can’t come down here. The police are searching the lower part of the house.” “My aunt! Has there been a burglary?” “They are looking for Mr. Shelf,” said the policeman, shortly. “There’s a warrant out against him for embezzlement. But that needn’t affect you gentlemen and ladies up-stairs. You can go on with your dancing.” The two guests looked at one another, and broke into a strained laugh. Then they calmed their faces again, and went back up the stair.