stairs via Mark Snyder, and the huge cheque received under cover
of a letter full of compliments on Henry's achievement. Macalistairs
announced that their _Magazine_ would shortly contain the opening
chapters of Mr. Henry Shakspere Knight's great romance, _The
Plague-Spot_, which would run for one year, and which combined a
tremendous indictment of certain phases of modern life with an original
love-story by turns idyllic and dramatic. _Gordon's Monthly_ was
serializing the novel in America. About this time, an interview with
Henry, suggested by Sir Hugh Macalistair himself, appeared in an
important daily paper. 'It is quite true,' said Henry in the interview,
'that I went to Monte Carlo to obtain first-hand material for my book.
The stories of my breaking the bank there, however, are wildly
exaggerated. Of course, I played a little, in order to be able to put
myself in the place of my hero. I should explain that I was in Monte
Carlo with my cousin, Mr. Dolbiac, the well-known sculptor and painter,
who was painting portraits there. Mr. Dolbiac is very much at home in
Parisian artistic society, and he happened to introduce me to a famous
French lady singer who was in Monte Carlo at the time. This lady and I
found ourselves playing at the same table. From time to time I put down
her stakes for her; that was all. She certainly had an extraordinary run
of luck, but the bank was actually broken at last by the united bets of
a number of people. That is the whole story, and I'm afraid it is much
less exciting and picturesque than the rumours which have been flying
about. I have never seen the lady since that day.'

Then his marriage had filled the air.

At an early stage in the preparations for that event his mother and
Aunt Annie became passive--ceased all activity. Perfect peace was
maintained, but they withdrew. Fundamentally and absolutely, Geraldine's
ideas were not theirs, and Geraldine did as she liked with Henry.
Geraldine and Henry interrogated Mark Snyder as to the future. 'Shall we
be justified in living at the rate of two thousand a year?' they asked
him. 'Yes,' he said, 'and four times that!' He had just perused _The
Plague-Spot_ in manuscript. 'Let's make it three thousand, then,' said
Geraldine to Henry. And she had planned the establishment of their home
on that scale. Henry did not tell the ladies at Dawes Road that the rent
of the flat was three hundred a year, and that the furniture had cost
over a thousand