ensive supper.

"Champagne," she answered, decidedly. "I've got quite used to it,
nowadays," she went on. "I could laugh to think how strange it tasted
when you first took me out."

"Tell me," Peter Ruff said, "why you have left your husband?"

She laughed.

"Because he was dull and because he was cross," she answered, "and
because the life down at Streatham was simply intolerable. I think it
was a little your fault, too," she said, making eyes; at him across the
table. "You gave me a taste of what life was like outside Streatham, and
I never forgot it."

Peter Ruff did not respond--he led the conversation, indeed, into other
channels. On the whole, the supper was scarcely a success. Maud, who was
growing to consider herself something of a Bohemian, and who certainly
looked for some touch of sentiment on the part of her old admirer, was
annoyed by the quiet deference with which he treated her. She reproached
him with it once, bluntly.

"Say," she exclaimed, "you don't seem to want to be so friendly as you
did! You haven't forgiven me yet, I suppose?"

Peter Ruff shook his head.

"It is not that," he said, "but I think that you have scarcely done a
wise thing in leaving your husband. I cannot think that this life on the
stage is good for you."

She laughed, scornfully.

"Well," she said, "I never thought to have you preaching at me!"

They finished their supper. Maud accepted a cigarette and did her
best to change her companion's mood. She only alluded once more to her
husband.

"I don't see how I could have stayed with him, anyhow," she said. "You
know, he's been put back--he only gets two pounds fifteen a week now. He
couldn't expect me to live upon that."

"Put back?" Peter Ruff repeated.

She nodded.

"He seemed to have a lot of bad luck this last year," she said. "All his
cases went wrong, and they don't think so much of him at Scotland Yard
as they did. I am not sure that he hasn't begun to drink a little."

"I am sorry to hear it," Peter Ruff said, gravely.

"I don't see why you should be," she answered, bluntly. "He was no
friend of yours, nor isn't now. He may not be so dangerous as he was,
but if ever you come across him, you take my tip and be careful. He
means to do you a mischief some day, if he can. I am not sure," she
added, "that he doesn't believe that it was partly your fault about my
leaving home."

"I should be sorry for him to think that," Peter Ruff answered. "While
we are u