"Nonsense!" Stephanie interrupted--"you're not to blame." "No--_I'm_ the guilty party," interrupted Pendleton. "I started the trouble when I had the dispute with Porshinger over the cut of his coat." "But you wouldn't have had that dispute if Porshinger hadn't spoken slightingly of Stephanie," Gladys remarked. "And Porshinger would not have had occasion to speak slightingly of me if I hadn't gone off with Amherst," Stephanie concluded. "So the primary guilt is mine--together with the further humiliation of having misjudged Porshinger. On the whole, I've succeeded in making about as complete a muddle of things as can well be imagined." "I confess that I'm puzzled what to do," Pendleton reflected--"whether to block Lorraine or to let him go on--and we must act quickly if we're to block him. It resolves itself, of course, into which will occasion the less talk--and I'm free to admit I don't know. It looks to me like a case of 'you'll be damned if you do and you'll be damned if you don't.' What do you think, Gladys?" "I think there isn't much choice. We're in a split stick. One way we face Porshinger's story and meet it with a passive denial, the other way we take the bull by the horns--that is, Lorraine forces us to--and tell the truth in court. As there can't be any question of blackmail, the latter _may_ be the better--it has the merit of sincerity, of faith in the facts. On the whole, I think that it will damn less than the passive denial of Dolittle's story." "I agree with Gladys:--we haven't much choice in the matter," remarked Stephanie hopelessly. "Lorraine is forcing the issue.--We simply have to meet it. I'm smirched anyway, but I shall be smirched less, it seems to me, by assuming the offensive." XVIII THE TRUTH BY PERSUASION Just then Porshinger drove up in his car. The hour was early and the east piazza was as yet occupied only by Mrs. Lorraine, Miss Chamberlain and Pendleton. He sighted them at once--stood a moment as though undecided, then came slowly toward them. "Can it be possible he will dare to join us!" Gladys exclaimed. "Anything is possible with _him_," Stephanie answered contemptuously--and turned her back. "Surely he won't have the effrontery!" Gladys insisted and looked away. "I can't think that even _he_ is cad enough for that," Pendleton remarked, busying himself with his cigarette. That no one glanced up at Porshinger's approach did not faze him an instant. It was one of the secrets of his success in life that, having come to a decision, he always saw it through. He knew his own mind--which is more than the average man does. "How-de-do, everybody!" he greeted. "May I sit down?" suiting the action to the word. "Miss Chamberlain, I salute you! also Mrs. Lorraine--and Mr. Pendleton. Bully day for golf--what do you say to a foursome?" Stephanie arose, looked straight at Porshinger with a deliberately ignoring stare, and turned to Miss Chamberlain.