Jack, the eavesdropper, stood transfixed at the voices and speeches, and forgot every other consideration in the overwhelming sickness of soul which overcame him that instant. All his other soul-sicknesses were trifles compared to this one, and the world—his world—their world—seemed to revolve and whirl and turn upside down, as he steadied himself against a spindle-legged cabinet and felt its spindle-legs trembling in sympathy with his own. “Darling,” said Holloway, a second or two later (and this time his voice was not calm and careless, but deep and impassioned), “the letter was very sweet, and if you knew how I longed to take the tired little girl to my bosom and comfort her troubles, and replace them by joys!” “Will that day ever come, do you think?” Mrs. Rosscott answered, in low tones, which nevertheless were most painfully clear and distinct in the next room. “It must,” Holloway replied, “just as surely as that I hold this dear little hand—” But Jack never knew more. He had heard enough—more than enough. Four thousand times too much. He turned and went out of the rooms, back down the stairs and out of the door, closed it noiselessly behind him, and found himself in a world which, although bright and sunny to all the rest of mankind, had turned dark, lonely, and cheerless to him. At first he hardly knew what to do with himself, he was so altogether used up by the discovery just made. He drifted up and down some unknown streets for an hour or two—or stood still on corners—he never was very sure which. And then at last he went downtown and took a drink in a half-dazed way; and because it was quite two months since his last indulgence, its suggestion was potent. The pity—or rather, the apparent pity—of what followed! Burnett was Sundaying at the ancestral castle; and Burnett wasn’t the warning sort, anyhow. He was always tow and pitch for any species of flame. So his absence counted for nothing in the crisis. And what ensued was a crisis—a crisis with a vengeance. That tear upon which Aunt Mary’s nephew went was something lurid and awful. It lasted until Monday, and then its owner returned to college, as ill of body and as embittered of spirit as it was in him to be. The lightsome devil who had ruled him up to his meeting with Mrs. Rosscott resumed its sway with terrible force. The authorities showed a tendency to patience because young Denham had appeared to reform lately and had been working hard; but young Denham felt no thankful sentiments for their leniency, and proved his position shortly.