oice.

Clutching the bed-rail, Winifred reached up and turned the switch of the
light hanging above her dressing-table. He appeared just on the rim of
the light's circumference, emblazoned from the absence of his watch-chain
down to boots neat and sooty brown, but--yes!--split at the toecap. His
chest and face were shadowy. Surely he was thin--or was it a trick of
the light? He advanced, lighted now from toe-cap to the top of his dark
head--surely a little grizzled! His complexion had darkened, sallowed;
his black moustache had lost boldness, become sardonic; there were lines
which she did not know about his face. There was no pin in his tie. His
suit--ah!--she knew that--but how unpressed, unglossy! She stared again
at the toe-cap of his boot. Something big and relentless had been 'at
him,' had turned and twisted, raked and scraped him. And she stayed, not
speaking, motionless, staring at that crack across the toe.

"Well!" he said, "I got the order. I'm back."

Winifred's bosom began to heave. The nostalgia for her husband which had
rushed up with that scent was struggling with a deeper jealousy than any
she had felt yet. There he was--a dark, and as if harried, shadow of his
sleek and brazen self! What force had done this to him--squeezed him
like an orange to its dry rind! That woman!

"I'm back," he said again. "I've had a beastly time. By God! I came
steerage. I've got nothing but what I stand up in, and that bag."

"And who has the rest?" cried Winifred, suddenly alive. "How dared you
come? You knew it was just for divorce that you got that order to come
back. Don't touch me!"

They held each to the rail of the big bed where they had spent so many
years of nights together. Many times, yes--many times she had wanted him
back. But now that he had come she was filled with this cold and deadly
resentment. He put his hand up to his moustache; but did not frizz and
twist it in the old familiar way, he just pulled it downwards.

"Gad!" he said: "If you knew the time I've had!"

"I'm glad I don't!"

"Are the kids all right?"

Winifred nodded. "How did you get in?"

"With my key."

"Then the maids don't know. You can't stay here, Monty."

He uttered a little sardonic laugh.

"Where then?"

"Anywhere."

"Well, look at me! That--that damned...."

"If you mention her," cried Winifred, "I go straight out to Park Lane and
I don't come back."

Suddenly he did a simple thing, but