Only last night there had been an intensely disagreeable scene in private; that is to say, she had been dignified and slightly contemptuous, while he had shouted that her knitting got on his nerves, and the sight of all those books on the war made him sick. When the whole business of the country was held up by this accursed war, a man would like to forget it when at home. And every man had the same story, by God; his wife was knitting when she ought to be darning stockings; trying to be intellectual by concerning herself with a subject that concerned men alone. Mr. Balfame had always resented the Woman's Club, and all talk of votes for a sex that would put him and his kind out of business. Their intelligent interest in the war was a grievous personal indignity. Being a woman of clear thought and firm purpose, and of a really high order of moral courage, Mrs. Balfame was daunted for a moment only. She laid down her cards, opened the door and entered the main room of the club-house. There she saw, at the head of the room, a group of men surrounding her husband; with one exception, almost as excited as he. The exception was Dwight Rush who had a hand on one of Balfame's shoulders and appeared to be addressing him in a low tone. Little Maude Battle ran forward and grasped her arm. "Oh, dear Mrs. Balfame," she gasped, "do take him home. He is so--so--queer. He snatched three girls away from their partners, and the boys are so mad. And his language--oh, it was something awful." The women and girls were huddled in groups, all but Alys Crumley, who, Mrs. Balfame vaguely realised, was sketching. Their eyes were fixed on the group at the head of the room, where Rush was now trying to edge the burly swaying figure toward the door. Mrs. Balfame walked directly up to her flushed and infuriated spouse. "You are not well, David," she said peremptorily. "In all the years of our married life never have you acted like this. I am sure that you are getting typhoid fever--" "To hell with typhoid fever!" shouted Mr. Balfame. "I'm drunk, that's what. And I'll be drunker when they let me into the bar. You get out of this." Mrs. Balfame turned to Dr. Anna, who had marched up the room beside her. "I am sure it is fever," she said with decision, and the loyal Anna nodded sagely. "You know that liquor never affects him. We must get him home."