There had been other times since, many of them. And she had grown so cursedly contemptuous and cold. Well--he didn't know that it was altogether his fault. He had heard that alcoholism was a disease. But she had said it was a curable disease, and if he couldn't cure it, he had better die. His own wife had told him that. God knows he had tried to cure it. He had put every pound he had into the fight; not once, but a hundred times. He had gone to Father Hervey and taken the pledge last Easter Day, and--here he was with a whiskey glass in his hand. He looked across into the high bar mirror. His eyes were yellow and his cheeks seemed to sag down. He put his hand to them to touch their flaccidity. His hair was thinning, there were red patches about his jaws where veins had broken, and his mouth seemed loose and ill-defined under the mustache which he wore to conceal it. He frowned fiercely, thrust his chin forward and gritted his teeth tightly to make of himself the reflection of a strong man--one who could domineer, like the big fellow. But it was no use--the mirror gave him back his lie. The afternoon rush was over, the evening trade had not begun, and the saloon was empty, save for a group of scat-players at the farther end. Jim's friends had gone, but he remained behind, in gloomy self-commiseration, his shoulders propped against the partition which marked off the cigar stand. He was thinking over his troubles, which was his commonest way of handling them. Whoever it was that invented the saying, "Life is just one damned thing after another"--he knew, he knew. Jim had bought three or four post-cards variously framing the sentiment and placed them upon his bureau, side by side, for Georgia to see. It was his criticism of life. You politicians and publicists, if you want to know what the public wants, linger at the rack in your corner drug store and look over the saws and sayings on the post-cards. Jim hoped that the ones he had picked out would subtly convey to his wife that all were adrift together upon a most perplexing journey and that it ill-behooved any of them to--well there was a post-card poem that just about hit it off--and he put it on the bureau with the others: "THERE IS SO MUCH BAD IN THE BEST OF US AND SO MUCH GOOD IN THE WORST OF US, THAT IT HARDLY BEHOOVES ANY OF US TO TALK ABOUT THE REST OF US." But she hadn't taken the least notice. She didn't seem to understand him at all. Oh, well--women were light creatures of clothes and moods and two-edged swords for tongues--or deadly silence. What could they know about the deep springs of life--about how a man felt when in trouble? Jim shifted his position slightly, for the hinge was beginning to trouble his shoulder blade, and fetched a sigh that was almost a moan. Such had been his life, merely that, and the future looked as bad or worse. The shilling bar grew a bit misty before him and he knew it wouldn't take much to make his eyes run over.