ng to your successors a legacy of evil which no man is
justified in leaving to his successors. No! Your case is in practice
irremediable. Like the murderer on the scaffold, you are the victim of
circumstances. And not one human being in a million will pity you. You
are a living tragedy which only death can end."

During this disconcerting session Eve had been mysteriously engaged in
the boudoir. She now came into the dark bedroom.

"What?" she softly murmured, hearing Mr. Prohack's restlessness. "Not
asleep, darling?" She bent over him and kissed him and her kiss was even
softer, more soporific, than her voice. "Now do go to sleep."

And Mr. Prohack went to sleep, and his last waking thought was, with the
feel of the kiss on his nose (the poor woman had aimed badly in the
dark): "Anyway this tragedy has one compensation, of which a hundred
quarter of a millions can't deprive me."

CHAPTER XV

THE HEAVY FATHER

I

Within a few moments of his final waking up the next morning, Mr.
Prohack beheld Eve bending over him, the image of solicitude. She was
dressed for outdoor business.

"How do you feel?" she asked, in a tender tone that demanded to know the
worst at once.

"Why?" asked Mr. Prohack, thus with one word, and a smile to match,
criticising her tone.

"You looked so dreadfully tired last night. I did feel sorry for you,
darling. Don't you think you'd better stay in bed to-day?"

"Can you seriously suggest such a thing?" he cried. "What about my daily
programme if I stay in bed? I have undertaken to be idle, and nobody can
be scientifically idle in bed. I'm late already. Where's my breakfast?
Where are my newspapers? I must begin the day without the loss of
another moment. Please give me my dressing-gown."

"I very much wonder how your blood-pressure is," Eve complained.

"And you, I suppose, are perfectly well?"

"Oh, yes, I am. I'm absolutely cured. Dr. Veiga is really very
marvellous. But I always told you he was."

"Well," said Mr. Prohack. "What's sauce for the goose has to be sauce
for the gander. If you're perfectly well, so am I. You can't have the
monopoly of good health in this marriage. What's that pamphlet you've
got in your hand, my dove?"

"Oh! It's nothing. It's only about the League of all the Arts. Mr.
Morfey gave it to me."

"I suppose it was that pamphlet you were reading last night in the
boudoir instead of coming to bed. Eve, you're hiding something from me.
Where are