for too
much from Gregory, but to realize that he had practically no sense of
moral obligation, and could be influenced to do justice only by the
expectation of obtaining her favor positively hurt her.

"I want them kept on, but I don't want you to do it for that reason,"
she said. "Can't you grasp the distinction, Gregory?"

A trace of darker color dyed Hawtrey's face, but while she was a little
surprised at the evidence that he felt her rebuke, he looked at her
steadily. He had not thought much about her during the last month, but
now the faint scorn in her voice aroused his resentment.

"Now," he said, "there are just three reasons, Aggy, why you should have
troubled yourself about this thing. You are, perhaps, a little sorry for
Moran's wife, but as you haven't even seen her that can hardly count for
much. The next is, that you don't care to see me doing what you regard
as a shabby thing; perhaps it is a shabby thing in some respects, but I
feel it's justifiable. Of course, if that's your reason there's a sense
in which, while not exactly complimentary--it's consoling."

He broke off, and looked at her with a question in his eyes, and it cost
Agatha an effort to meet his. She was not prudish or overconscious of
her own righteousness, but once or twice, after the shock of her
disillusionment in regard to him had lessened, she had dreamed of the
possibility of endowing him little by little with some of the qualities
she had once fancied he possessed, and, as she vaguely thought of it,
rehabilitating him. Now, however, the thing seemed impossible, and, what
was more, the desire to bring it about had gone. Hateful as the
situation was becoming, she was honest, and she could not let him credit
her with a motive that had not influenced her.

In the meanwhile, her very coldness and aloofness stirred desire in the
man, and she shrank as she saw a spark of passion kindling in his eyes.
She recognized that there was a strain of grossness in him.

"No," she responded, "that reason was not one which had any weight with
me."

Hawtrey's face darkened. "Then," he said grimly, "we'll get on to the
third. Wyllard's credit is a precious thing to you; sooner than anything
should cast a stain on it you would beg a favor from--me. You have set
him up on a pedestal, and it would hurt you if he came down. Considering
everything, it's a remarkably curious situation."

Agatha grew pale. Gregory was horribly right, for she had no dou