He had seen Alicia March several times during the first winter of her marriage, when she immediately became one of the great hostesses of Washington. Colegrove was by nature social, and liked, as well as any one, a good dinner, a good glass of wine and a pretty woman on each side of him. His position as the moving spirit of an association of great railways, which some people called a conspiracy, placed him somewhat at a disadvantage with public men in Washington. Senator March, however, liked Colegrove well enough, and was by no means afraid of him, and if Alicia March wanted to have him at her brilliant dinners her husband made no objection. Senator March was chairman of the committee which was dealing with Colegrove and his associates, but so far nothing had been discovered of a nature damaging to Colegrove or his friends. As he good-humouredly told Senator March, the railways asked only to be let alone; and Senator March, with equal good humour, replied that was the very thing that the committee did not mean to do. As the committee would not agree to let Colegrove alone, but persisted in asking prying questions, the next best thing for him was to find out exactly what the committee knew, and how it proposed to act. Alicia March was the instrument ready to his hand. Colegrove, who had a vast quantity of that semi-divine gift known as common-sense, was under no illusion respecting Alicia March’s influence over her husband. Senator March was deeply devoted to his wife, but neither she nor any other human being who ever lived could swerve Roger March from his duty, or cause him to betray the smallest trust. He was not, however, on guard against his wife, and Colegrove knew it. When he passed the March house late at night and saw the lights burning in Senator March’s study, and knew that he was at work there with his clerk and a stenographer, Colegrove longed to know what they were writing. How easy it would be for Mrs. March to make a few copies of the letters and memoranda, which would be immensely useful to the A.F.&O.! Reflecting on this, Colegrove cultivated Mrs. March’s society. Being a man of acute observation, he found out some things about Alicia March which not even her husband knew. He discovered that she had a strange sense of dislocation in her new place. She had been forced, as she thought, in her previous life to have many concealments, and she still had them, but they gave her a vague sense of discomfort which she had never known before. Still the habit was upon her, and she had the conviction that concealment, however wrong, was absolutely necessary.