She restored the vial to its place, laying the closed case by her plate, and left the room. The instant the door closed behind her, Dr. Ashton reached across the table, possessed himself of the vial, returning the case to its former position. His wife turned just outside the door, and came back with a meaning smile to take up the empty case and lock it again in the cabinet. "I cannot trust you," she remarked with a smile; "you are too eager to foil the gods." He smiled in return, holding his wine-glass up to the light. "There is more where that came from," he said. "You forget my profession." "Of what are you musing so intently?" Helen queried, half an hour later, while, the supper being ended, her husband was enjoying his cigar. "Of two things which I have to communicate. One is a folly and the other--or perhaps I should say each--is a misfortune." "The folly," returned she, "I forgive; the misfortune I regret. What are they?" "I am glad you forgive the folly. That gives me boldness to tell it. I have fallen in love." "You, Will! With whom?" "That is the madness of it. With my wife." "Will!" "It is the truth," he went on, half whimsically, but with a certain ring of earnestness in his tone. "I acknowledge the madness, the poor taste of a man's falling in love with his own wife, but the fact stubbornly remains. I have been in love with you for a long time, but I stood back for Arthur like a good fellow." "I never was in love with Arthur," she interrupted. "It is no matter," he continued. "The question is, can't you get up a grain of grace for me, old lady?" He leaned over the table, his dark eyes shining as she had never seen them before. She was fascinated by his gaze; she felt as if the ground were slipping from beneath her feet, and as though he were casting upon her an evil spell. A wave of despair swept over her. Must she again submit to his power; were the old days of bitter bondage to return; was she nothing but a puppet to his will? In this extremity a memory saved her. Unable to withdraw her gaze from her husband's face, there came to her suddenly the look in the eyes of Grant Herman that day when he told her his love. The blood surged to her cheeks, but her calmness returned. "It is of no use, Will," she said with gentle firmness. "All that is past forever between us. We had better not speak of it," she added wistfully. "I have so few friends that I cannot bear to lose any one of them." "My folly is then my misfortune," he responded, with no appearance of diminished good humor. "It is the pleasure of the gods to torment me; I suppose it amuses them. The old Romans were only aping them in their blood-thirsty sports, and I fancy that is the secret of their deification, for nothing seems so much to the liking of the gods as to torment humanity."