"And you forget that--that devil--suppose she's as good as her threat?" "Absurd! how could she be?" "You don't know her, you know, nor the old beggar either, by Jove!" "All the more reason for haste. We'll call to-morrow. Wait. Better still, perhaps I can enlist the Gwilt-Athelston; I'm to meet her to-morrow. I'll let you know. Now I must get into my teaharness, so run along." We are next constrained to glance at a strong man bowed in the hurt of a great grief. Horace Milbrey sits alone in his gloomy, high-ceilinged library. His attire is immaculate. His slender, delicate hands are beautifully white. The sensitive lines of his fine face tell of the strain under which he labours. What dire tragedies are those we must face wholly alone--where we must hide the wound, perforce, because no comprehending sympathy flows out to us; because instinct warns that no help may come save from the soul's own well of divine fortitude. Some hope, tenderly, almost fearfully, held and guarded, had perished on the day that should have seen its triumphant fruition. He raised his handsome head from the antique, claw-footed desk, sat up in his chair, and stared tensely before him. His emotion was not to be suppressed. Do tears tremble in the eyes of the strong man? Let us not inquire too curiously. If they tremble down the fine-skinned cheek, let us avert our gaze. For grief in men is no thing to make a show of. A servant passed the open door bearing an immense pasteboard box with one end cut out to accommodate the long stems of many roses. "Jarvis!" "Yes, sir!" "What is it?" "Flowers, sir, for Miss Avice." "Let me see--and the card?" He took the card from the florist's envelope and glanced at the name. "Take them away." The stricken man was once more alone; yet now it was as if the tender beauty of the flowers had balmed his hurt--taught him to hope anew. Let us in all sympathy and hope retire. For cheerfuller sights we might observe Launton Oldaker in a musty curio-shop, delighted over a pair of silver candlesticks with square bases and fluted columns, fabricated in the reign of that fortuitous monarch, Charles the Second; or we might glance in upon the Higbees in their section of a French chateau, reproduced up on the stately Riverside Drive, where they complete the details of a dinner to be given on the morrow. Or perhaps it were better to be concerned with a matter more weighty than dinners and antique candlesticks. The search need never be vain, even in this world of persistent frivolity. As, for example: "Tell Mrs. Van Geist if she can't come down, I'll run up to her." "Yes, Miss Milbrey." Mrs. Van Geist entered a moment later. "Why, Avice, child, you're glowing, aren't you?" "I must be, I suppose--I've just walked down from 59th Street, and before that I walked in the Park. Feel how cold my cheeks are,--Muetterchen." "It's good for you. Now we shall have some tea, and talk."