down in the full warmth
of the hearth.

"_Le lit de justice_," she repeated, gaily. "Here I preside, possessing
inquisitorial power and prerogative, and exercising here to-night the
high justice, the middle, and the low. Now hale before me those skulking
knaves, Doubt, Suspicion, and Distrust, and you and I will make short
work of them. Pull 'em along by their ears, Louis! This Court means to
sit all night if necessary!"

[Illustration: "'How perfectly horrid you can be!' she exclaimed."]

She laughed merrily, raised herself on one arm, and looked him straight
in the eyes:

"Louis!"

"What?"

"Do you doubt me?"

"Doubt what?"

"That my friendship for you is as warm as the moment it began?"

He said, unsmiling: "People meet as we met, become friends--very good,
very close friends--in that sort of friendship which is governed by
chance and environment. The hazard that throws two people into each
other's company is the same hazard that separates them. It is not
significant either way.... I liked you--missed you.... Our companionship
had been pleasant."

"Very," she said, quietly.

He nodded: "Then chance became busy; your duties led you elsewhere--mine
set me adrift in channels once familiar--"

"Is that all you see in our estrangement?"

"What?" he asked, abruptly.

"Estrangement," she repeated, tranquilly. "That is the real word for it.
Because the old intimacy is gone. And now we both admit it."

"We have had no opportunity to be together this--"

"We once _made_ opportunities."

"We have had no time--"

"We halted time, hastened it, dictated to it, ruled it--once."

"Then explain it otherwise if you can."

"I am trying to--with God's help. Will you aid me, too?"

Her sudden seriousness and emotion startled him.

"Louis, if our estrangement is important enough for us to notice at all,
it is important enough to analyse, isn't it?"

"I have analysed the reasons--"

"Truthfully?"

"I think so--as far as I have gone--"

"Let us go farther, then--to the end."

"But there is no particular significance--"

"Isn't there?"

"I don't know. After all, _why_ did you leave that cafe? Why did _I_?
Why are we together, now--here in your studio, and utterly miserable at
one o'clock of the New Year's morning? For you and I are unhappy and ill
at ease; and you and I are talking at cross purposes, groping, evading,
fencing with words. If there is nothing significant in the friendship we
gave each