on traitor to the worthier mind; it
was the time of reverie that rapt him above everything ignoble, only to
embitter by contrast the destiny he could not break. He rose now with
the early sun; walked fast and far before the beginning of his day's
work, with an aim he knew to be foolish, yet could not abandon. From
Guildford Street, along the byways, he crossed Tottenham Court Road,
just rattling with its first traffic, crossed Portland Place, still in
its soundest sleep, and so onward till he touched Bryanston Square. The
trees were misty with half-unfolded leafage birds twittered cheerily
among the branches; but Piers heeded not these things. He stood before
the high narrow-fronted house, which once he had entered as a guest,
where never again would he be suffered to pass the door. Irene was
here, he supposed, but could not be sure, for on the rare occasions
when he saw Olga Hannaford they did not speak of her cousin. Of the
course her life had taken, he knew nothing whatever. Here, in the chill
bright morning, he felt more a stranger to Irene than on the day, six
years ago, when with foolish timidity he ventured his useless call. She
was merely indifferent to him then; now she shrank from the sound of
his name.

On such a morning, a few weeks later, he pursued his walk in the
direction of Kensington, and passed along Queen's Gate. It was between
seven and eight o'clock. Nearing John Jacks house, he saw a carriage at
the door; it could of course be only the doctor's, and he became sad in
thinking of his kind old friend, for whom the last days of life were
made so hard. Just as he was passing, the door opened, and a man,
evidently a doctor, came quickly forth. With movement as if he were
here for this purpose, Otway ran up the steps; the servant saw him, and
waited with the door still open.

"Will you tell me how Mr. Jacks is?" he asked.

"I am sorry to say, sir," was the subdued answer, "that Mr. Jacks died
at three this morning."

Piers turned away. His eyes dazzled in the sunshine.

The evening papers had the news, with a short memoir--half of which was
concerned not with John Jacks, but with his son Arnold.

It seemed to him just possible that he might receive an invitation to
attend the funeral; but nothing of the kind came to him. The slight, he
took it for granted, was not social, but personal. His name, of course,
was offensive to Arnold Jacks, and probably to Mrs. John Jacks; only
the genial old man had