The inevitable compassed him about and numbed his stern, merciless system of self-repression. Fate, irresistible and unchangeable, obscured the clear path of duty which he had marked out for himself, and held him for the moment her passive victim. It was no idle fancy. He was not a man in whose thought-world fancy played any part. Nor was it the gloomy impression which a lonely twilight might have stamped upon a mind already burdened with a heavy weight of trouble. The young day spread her halo of pure sunshine over a world of color; the red rose upon his table bowed her head toward him in the perfection of a mature beauty which as yet hid no warning of decay. But in the sunshine he saw the shadow; the daylight foretold the night; his eyes saw the withered petals of the rose strewn before him. In vain he had striven to see beyond the night to the as inevitable to-morrow; in vain he had pictured the rose which his careful hand would bring to replace her dead sister. The future was a blank dead wall whose heights his foresight could not scale. Before him on the table lay a closed and sealed envelope. It contained his will, which half an hour before he had signed in the presence of two comrades. He wondered what the world would say when it was opened--and when it would be opened. Presently the curtains behind him were pushed quietly on one side. He did not turn around. He supposed it was his native servant with the cup of coffee which formed his early morning refreshment; but the soft step across the uncarpeted floor, the rustle of a woman's dress startled him from his illusion. He turned and sprang to his feet. "Beatrice!" he exclaimed. She came toward him with outstretched hand. "May I speak with you for a few minutes, John?" she asked. His first impulse to protest against her reckless disregard of propriety died away on his lips. Something on her white earnest face touched him--all the more perhaps because it linked itself with his own mood. He brought a chair--his own, for the room boasted of but one. "Are you angry?" she asked again, looking up at him. "At your coming? No. At another time I might have warned you that it was not wise, but I feel sure you would not have run so much risk without a serious and adequate reason." She nodded. "Yes, I have a very serious reason," she said. "Have you time to spare?" "All the morning." "Were you on duty last night?" "For the best part." "Is that why you look so tired and ill?" He smiled faintly. "I might reply with a _tu quoque_. But that doesn't matter. You have some trouble to tell me. What has happened?" "You have heard nothing?" "Nothing whatever." He drew a stool toward him and seated himself at her side. "You know, I am not a person to whom gossip drifts quickly." "It's not gossip--it's truth. The Marut Diamond Company is closed--for good and all." "You mean--it has gone smash?" "Completely--and we with it."