Ray Vilas, left alone, elevated his heels to the sill, and stared out of the window a long time at a gravelled roof which presented little of interest. He replenished his glass and his imagination frequently, the latter being so stirred that when, about three o'clock, he noticed the inroads he had made upon the bottle, tears of self-pity came to his eyes. "Poor little drunkard!" he said aloud. "Go ahead and do it. Isn't anything _you_ won't do!" And, having washed his face at a basin in a corner, he set his hat slightly upon one side, picked up a walking stick and departed jauntily, and, to the outward eye, presentably sober. Mr. Valentine Corliss would be glad to see him, the clerk at the Richfield Hotel reported, after sending up a card, and upon Ray's following the card, Mr. Valentine Corliss in person confirmed the message with considerable amusement and a cordiality in which there was some mixture of the quizzical. He was the taller; and the robust manliness of his appearance, his splendid health and boxer's figure offered a sharp contrast to the superlatively lean tippler. Corliss was humorously aware of his advantage: his greeting seemed really to say, "Hello, my funny bug, here you are again!" though the words of his salutation were entirely courteous; and he followed it with a hospitable offer. "No," said Vilas; "I won't drink with you." He spoke so gently that the form of his refusal, usually interpreted as truculent, escaped the other's notice. He also declined a cigar, apologetically asking permission to light one of his own cigarettes; then, as he sank into a velour-covered chair, apologized again for the particular attention he was bestowing upon the apartment, which he recognized as one of the suites de luxe of the hotel. "`Parlour, bedroom, and bath,'" he continued, with a melancholy smile; "and `Lachrymae,' and `A Reading from Homer.' Sometimes they have `The Music Lesson,' or `Winter Scene' or `A Neapolitan Fisher Lad' instead of `Lachrymae,' but they always have `A Reading from Homer.' When you opened the door, a moment ago, I had a very strong impression that something extraordinary would some time happen to me in this room." "Well," suggested Corliss, "you refused a drink in it." "Even more wonderful than that," said Ray, glancing about the place curiously. "It may be a sense of something painful that already has happened here--perhaps long ago, before your occupancy. It has a pathos." "Most hotel rooms have had something happen in them," said Corliss lightly. "I believe the managers usually change the door numbers if what happens is especially unpleasant. Probably they change some of the rugs, also." "I feel----" Ray paused, frowning. "I feel as if some one had killed himself here." "Then no doubt some of the rugs _have_ been changed."