Torch was set to tinder at last one evening after dinner. Whether there had been conspiracy in the event or no Gabriel could never tell. Cynicisms had been exchanged during the meal. After dessert Gabriel had retired straightway to the library, and Ophelia had followed him, pale and stiff about the lips, a woman bent on battle. She had come by some excuse for an attack upon the man, and her tongue soon set the scene ablaze. Hot words were exchanged, taunts, recriminations, and the like. As a climax the woman overturned a writing-table with a crash at her husband’s feet, flung defiance in his face, and left him. Ophelia had compassed the necessary finale. As she passed back up the passage towards the hall, she tore her dress at the neck, and, taking the substance of her left arm between her teeth, she bruised the flesh till purple blood showed under the skin. Meeting no witnesses upon the way, she disordered her hair as she climbed the oak stairway, and beat her mouth with her fist so that her lips bled. By some foreordained coincidence Miss Mabel Saker was looking over the contents of her jewel-case in the “blue bedroom.” Moreover, this particular room was set directly above the library, and any occupant thereof could hear in measure what passed below. Hence, when Ophelia Strong entered to her friend, that lady received her with a shocked pity that was zealously dramatic. “Dear, what has happened?” By way of retort Gabriel’s wife displayed to her indignant confidante her bruised arm and bleeding mouth. “The cad; the mean coward!” was Miss Saker’s cry. “I heard him storming at you. How did it happen?” “He lost his temper,” said the wife. “By Jove, if I were only a man!” “I feel faint, Mab.” “The brute! Let me bathe your mouth.” Angelic ministerings to misfortune ensued. Smelling-salts, eau-de-cologne, and much sympathy were forthcoming. Ophelia lay back in a lounge-chair breathing spasmodically, with certain hysteric symptoms, while Miss Saker hung over her and bathed her face. Ophelia clasped her arm about her friend’s neck and drew her face down close to hers. Her disordered hair had fallen upon her shoulders, a pathetic web of gold. “You will remember this, Mab,” she said, significantly. “Should I forget it, dear! If James Maltravers only knew!” The woman in the chair shuddered and hid her face in the other’s bosom. “Can I stay here much longer?” she said. “Good Heavens, no! He will be killing you next. There must be an end to this.”