She left me standing in the passage, a thing that had never before occurred to me in Judith’s establishment, and presently returned with her answer. Would I mind waiting in the dining-room? I entered. The table was littered with sheets of her statistical work and odd bits of silk’ and lining. A type-writer stood at one end and a sewing-machine at the other. On the writing-desk by the window, in the midst of a mass of letters and account-books, rested a large bowl filled with magnificent blooms of white and yellow chrysanthemums. A volume of Dante lay open face downwards on the corner. It did my heart good to see this untidiness, so characteristic of Judith, so familiar, so intimate. She had taken her trouble bravely, I reflected. The ordinary daily task had not been left undone. Through all she had preserved her valiant sanity. I felt rebuked for my own loss of self-control. I was about to turn away from the litter of the desk, when my eye caught sight of an envelope bearing a French stamp and addressed in Pasquale’s unmistakable handwriting. As there seemed to be a letter inside, I did not take it up to examine it more closely. The glance was enough to assure me that it came from Pasquale. Why should he be corresponding with Judith? I walked away puzzled. Was it a justification, a confession, a plea to her as my friend to obtain my forgiveness? If there is one thing more irritating than another it is to light accidentally upon a mystery affecting oneself in a friend’s correspondence. One can no more probe deeply into it than one can steal the friend’s spoons. It seems an indiscretion to have noticed it, an unpardonable impertinence to subject it to conjecture. In spite of my abhorring the impulse of curiosity, the sweeping, flaunting, swaggering handwriting of Pasquale worried me. Judith came in, looking much as she had done on the occasion of my last visit, worn and anxious, with a strange expression in her eyes. “I am sorry to have kept you waiting,” she said, extending a lifeless hand. I raised it to my lips. “I would have gladly waited all day to see you, Judith,” I said. “Really?” She laughed in an odd way. “And idle speech from me to you at the present time would be an outrage,” I answered. “I have passed through much since I saw you last.” “So have I,” said Judith. “More than you imagine. Well,” she continued as I bowed my head accepting the rebuke, “what have you got so important to tell me?” “Much,” said I. “In the first place you must be aware of what has happened, for I can’t help seeing there a letter from Pasquale.” She glanced swiftly at the desk and back again at me. “Yes,” she replied, “he is in Paris.” I was amazed at her nonchalance. “Has he told you nothing?” “Perhaps Sir Marcus Ordeyne would like to see his letter,” she said, ironically. “You know perfectly well that I would not read it,” said I. Judith laughed again, and rolled her handkerchief into a little ball between her nervous fingers.