That a man is capable of sustaining two absorbing interests at once is a matter of every-day illustration. Are we not surrounded by men who do their work well in life, and love their wives well at home, without allowing the one to interfere with the other? That women are capable of the same seems exceedingly probable. But we are a race of sheep who run after each other, guided for the moment by a catchword which will not bear investigation, or an erroneous deduction set in alliterative verse which clings to the mind and sways it. Thus we all think that woman's whole existence is, and is only capable of, love, because a poet, in the trickiness of his trade, once said so. Now, Paul held a different opinion. He thought that Etta could manage to love him well, as she said she did, and yet take an interest in that which was in reality the object of his life. He intended to take the earliest opportunity of telling her all about the work he was endeavoring to carry out at Osterno, and the knowledge that he was withholding something from her was a constant burden to an upright and honest nature. "I think," he said one morning to Steinmetz, "that I will write and tell Mrs. Sydney Bamborough all about this place." "I should not do that," replied Steinmetz with a leisurely promptitude. They were alone in a great smoking-room of which the walls were hung all round with hunting trophies. Paul was smoking a post-prandial cigar. Steinmetz reflected gravely over a pipe. They were both reading Russian newspapers--periodicals chiefly remarkable for that which they leave unsaid. "Why not?" asked Paul. "On principle. Never tell a woman that which is not interesting enough to magnify into a secret." Paul turned over his newspaper. He began reading again. Then, suddenly, he looked up. "We are engaged to be married," he observed pointedly. Steinmetz took his pipe from his lips slowly and imperturbably. He was a man to whom it was no satisfaction to impart news. He either knew it before or did not take much interest in the matter. "That makes it worse," he said. "A woman only conceals what is bad about her husband. If she knows anything that is likely to make other women think that their husbands are inferior, she will tell it." Paul laughed. "But this is not good," he argued. "We have kept it so confoundedly quiet that I am beginning to feel as if it is a crime." Steinmetz uncrossed his legs, crossed them again, and then spoke after mature reflection: "As I understand the law of libel, a man is punished, not for telling a lie, but for telling either the truth or a lie with malicious intent. I imagine the Almighty will take the intent into consideration, if human justice finds it expedient to do so!"