go under" because he could not
hold his head up: to disappear from among the honourable and the
strenuous, to be dragged down by the weight of some shameful deed which
would make him unfit to consort with people of his own kind. As he
walked home he was not conscious, perhaps, of trying to look his
situation in the face, of trying to adjust himself to it. And yet
insensibly things began falling into shape, as particles of sand
gradually subside after a whirlwind and settle into a definite form.
Then Stamfordham's words rang in his ears: "I must tell my colleagues."
It was a small fraction of the world in number, perhaps, that would thus
know how it happened, but they were, to Rendel, the only people who
mattered--the people, practically, in whose hands his own future lay. He
realised now as he had never done before in what calm confidence he had
in his inmost heart looked on that future, and most of all how much, how
entirely he had always counted on Lord Stamfordham's good opinion of his
integrity and worth. It was all gone. What should he do? How should he
take hold of life now?

As he waited at a corner to cross the road, he saw big newspaper boards
stuck up. The second edition of the other morning papers was coming out
with the news eagerly caught up from the _Arbiter_. There it was in big
letters, people stopping to read it as they passed: "Startling
Disclosure. Unexpected Action of the Government." No power on earth
could stop that knowledge from spreading now. How it would turn the
country upside down--what a fever of conjecture, what storms of
disapproval from some, of jubilation from others. What frantic
excitement was in store for the few who, with vigilance strained to the
utmost, were steering warily through such a storm! Rendel involuntarily
stopped and read with the others.

Some people he knew drove by in a victoria, two exquisitely dressed
women who smiled and bowed to him as they passed--chance acquaintances
whom he met in society, and to whom under ordinary circumstances he
would have been profoundly indifferent.

Rendel could almost have stood still in sheer terror at realising some
numbing sense that was stealing over him, some horrible change in his
view of things that was already beginning. For as they bowed to him with
unimpaired friendliness, he felt conscious of a distinct sensation of
relief, almost of gratitude, that in spite of what had happened they
should still be willing to greet him. G