type, the books,
if I am a judge, had literary style. They were much more than mere
diaries. True, each entry began with a note of the day's weather, and
certain small records of the writer's personal affairs; but these went
oddly enough with what followed; a biting analysis of the inner life,
the estimated intentions and emotions, of the beings nearest to him. It
was inhuman stuff. But Worth was right; there was no soil for suicide in
this matter written by a hand guided by a harsh, censorious mind; too
much egotism here to willingly give over the role of conscience for his
friends. Friends?--could a man have friends who regarded humanity
through such unkindly, wide open, all-seeing eyes?

Worth, seated across from me on the other side of the fire, stared
straight into the leaping blaze; but I doubted if that was what he saw.
On his face was the look which I had come to know, of the dignified
householder who had gone in and shut the door on whatever of dismay and
confusion might be in his private affairs. I began to read his father's
version of the separation from his mother, with its ironic references to
her most intimate friend.

"Marion would like to see Laura Bowman ship Tony and marry Jim Edwards.
I swear the modern woman has played bridge so long that her idea of the
most serious obligation in life--the marriage vow--is, 'Never mind. If
you don't like the hand you have got, shuffle, cut, and deal again!'"

I dropped the book to my knee and looked over at Worth, asking,

"This Mrs. Dr. Bowman that we met last night at Tait's--she was a
special friend of your mother's?"

"They were like sisters--in more than one way." I knew without his
telling it that he alluded to their common misfortune of being both
unhappily married. His mother, a woman of more force than the other, had
gained her freedom.

"_Femina Priores._" I came on an entry standing oddly alone. "Marion is
to secure the divorce--at my suggestion. I have demanded that our son
share his time between us."

Again I let the book down on my knee and looked across at the silent
fellow there. And I had heard him compassionate Barbara Wallace for
having painful memories of her childhood! I believe he was at that
moment more at peace with his father than he had ever been in his
life--and that he grieved that this was so. I knew, too, that the
forgiveness and forgetting would not extend to these pitiless records.
Without disturbing him, I laid the book I hel