A commercial house in Frankfort failed–a house with which Mr. Bolton’s firm had always done a large amount of business. A meeting of creditors was called, at which it was highly desirable that principals should be present. Wellfield wished to remain at home and let it pass, but Avice having incautiously spoken about it, Nita insisted, with a determination that was almost vehement, that he should go. It was ascertained that he could easily go and return in a week, and as a telegram requesting his presence came to add to the pressure, he went one morning in the first half of the month. [Illustration] CHAPTER VIII. JEROME. ‘There is nothing more galling than to receive pity where we would fain inspire love.’ There had been a long and stormy meeting of creditors–fierce disputes over the accounts which were brought forward, much vituperation, much gesticulation, and Jerome Wellfield had sat through it all, like a man in a dream, scarcely hearing a word. He leaned back in his chair, his hands in his pockets and his face set, his eyes fixed frowningly upon the green leather top of the table at which he sat. Two sentences which he had heard, earlier in the day, exchanged between two gentlemen in the coffee-room of his hotel, had banished all other subjects from his mind. ‘When is Falkenberg going to be back from that immense _Reise in’s Blaue_ that he undertook in May? and has he left his wife alone all this time?’ ‘Oh, I fancy no one knows when he will be back. His wife is at his place at Lahnburg. She is very quiet, they say, and people think they have had a quarrel. Don’t know how much of it is true, I am sure.’ He had heard every word of it. The two speakers had sat at the next table to his as he breakfasted that morning. Ever since, heart and head alike had been in a tumult. Not an hour’s journey distant from him, and alone! Of course he must not go to see her, it would be the height of folly and presumption and wickedness; but could he not get one glimpse of her, take one glance into her face unseen by her; have a view of her, perhaps, as she walked in her garden–or behold some outline of her form at the window. That would be enough. There would be nothing wrong in that; he could see her, and she would not see him; having seen her, he could return home with a quieter heart. The mention of her name, the knowledge of her proximity to him, had revealed, as such incidents do reveal, his own inmost soul to himself, and shrined there he found Sara Ford still, and knew not whether to rejoice that he yet loved her whose equal he had never seen, or whether to mourn that he could not cast that love aside, and content himself with the things that were his.