“Bravo! Simmons! Bravo! A song!” rose from some of the guests. “Sing your old song, Sim!” one called out. The guests jostled into the dining-room, deserting the terrace, where they had been supping and flirting. There were some among the men who had been at the School of Mines and knew his college fame. “So your husband sings?” Dr. Vessinger asked. “We will hear,” his wife replied tranquilly. “Listen!” The drinking song, which was not meant for dinner-parties where any proprieties were observed, rolled out, at first uncertainly and then with greater force. At the end of the stanza, young men’s voices from all over the house shouted out the chorus. One or two of the older men shook their heads, and while laughing said: “No, no. That’s too bad! Some one should stop him.” “It seems to take,” Dr. Vessinger murmured to Mrs. Simmons. “He has chosen that moment of inspiration when we are all drunk enough to think it a great song and not too drunk to join the chorus. Bravo! More, more!” he called with those who were applauding. It was, apparently, a tremendous success. Men were patting Simmons on the back, and a servant was filling his glass with champagne. The calls for another stanza grew more clamorous. His wife looked at him stonily. She did not make much of his unaccustomed drinking, of the spectacle he was offering of himself to their public. She was wondering at his male mind. How could _he_ find it in him--just now with the truth they both knew but two hours cold in his memory--how could he find the heart to drink and sing? She had said to him defiantly that she would get joy in spite of all. But was there anything in life which could make her drink and sing and forget? Her heart was shut to pleasure, and she looked at him coldly, as one might look at a bad actor who is much applauded. * * * * * He, poor man! had sat down to the feast with the twin devils of despair and remorse by his side. The others around him laughed and were merry. Why should _his_ food taste bitter when to them it seemed sweet? Why should his be the wife and his the child? He felt himself to be a common man, and wished to have their taste for the feast, their content with common life. So he began to drink because it was pleasant to drink. The devils faded as the spirit of champagne entered him. At last he was comfortable, and then happy. The woman by his side, the Magnificent Wreck, became beautiful, witty, and alluring. The woman at his left smiled with a pretty doll’s smile, showing her nice teeth, white like porcelain. He was drunk; he knew it, and he was happy! So he wanted to sing, to make the room ring with his new joy. There seemed to open a concealed door in his mind, and out tramped words and sounds, expressing beautiful, happy feelings; he was singing.... “On the table! On the table!” they shouted to him. “Up, up!”