through the
doorway, "if he's with us, we--your wife--wins!"

"Anyhow," Hamilton soliloquized, "win or lose, it's a great game!"

Then, he turned to regard his wife, with eyes in which amazement vied
with admiration.

CHAPTER XIX

Cicily, under her husband's intent gaze, felt a glow of embarrassment.
To conceal her emotion, she turned, and seated herself in a chair, where
she relaxed into a posture as listlessly indifferent as she could
contrive in this moment of pleasurable turmoil.

Now, indeed, she realized that the moment of her vindication in this
man's estimation was at hand. It was her brain that had evolved the ruse
by which his enemies would be worsted. Delancy and Hamilton might still
retain doubts as to the issue of the affair, but she had none. Her
instinct, which had so ably guided her to this point, now assured her
that victory was assured. It must be, then, that the husband who had
treated her claims and pretensions so fleeringly would henceforth
recognize her worth. He had been helpless in the grasp of circumstance,
and the flood of disaster had threatened to overwhelm him. She had
plucked him forth from the whirlpool, had brought him safe to shore.
She had most nobly justified herself in the role of Mrs. Partner....
This was her hour of supreme delight. The lines of fatigue had vanished
from the lovely face as if by magic; her eyes were happy, shining in a
clear contentment; her scarlet lips were molded into a smile of joy, and
from them a dimple crept to make a tiny shadow in the pale oval of the
cheek.

As for Hamilton, that young business man found himself in a maze of
perplexity, as he stood for a long time in silence, studying the fair
picture of femininity there offered to his gaze. In his breast, various
emotions warred lustily. He was a-thrill with elation over the
possibility of outwitting the foes who had used every wile and
subterfuge of trickiness to ruin him. He was moved to a profound
admiration for the intelligence that had originated and carried out a
counter plot so instantly effective in his interests. But underlying
these was a grievous hurt to his egotism. The pride of the male was
wounded sore. Where he, the head of the house, the lord of the home, the
man of affairs, had ignominiously failed, that frail creature, his
wife, whom he had criticised and rebuked time and again, had snatched
victory from defeat by clever and unscrupulous machinations worthy of a
master of