ow aside that mantle of urbanity which he must yet endure
for a while before other eyes. He formed the habit of gazing up at the
portrait of the ancestor who had died in the revolution and almost
fancied that between his own eyes and those painted on the canvas there
was an interchange of understanding.

He was in truth a man who had already parted company with reason while
still invested in its perfect masquerade. His bitter and unfounded
suspicions, denied all outer expression, had undermined his sanity--and
any one who had seen him in these moments of sequestered brooding would
have recognized the mad glitter in his eyes.

"The pair of them are as guilty as perdition," he murmured to himself,
"and I am God's instrument to punish." Punish--but how? That was a
detail which he had never quite thought out, but at the proper time the
Providence which commanded him would also show him a way. But before
punishment there must be an overt act--an episode which clinched,
beyond peradventure, the sin of these two hypocrites before his hand
could fall in vengeance.

These reflections were interrupted one afternoon by a rap on the study
door to which, for the space of several seconds, Eben Tollman did not
respond.

He was meanwhile doing what an actor does before his dressing-room
mirror. Eben Tollman alone with his monomania and Eben Tollman in the
company of others were separate personalities and to pass from one to
the other called for making up; for schooling of expression and the
recovery of a suave exterior. In this process, however, he had from
habit acquired celerity, so the delay was not a marked one before, with
a decorous face, unstamped of either passion or brooding, he opened the
door, to find Conscience waiting at the threshold.

"Come in, my dear," he invited. "I must have inadvertently snapped the
catch. I didn't know it was locked."

"There's a man named Hagan here who wants to see you, Eben," announced
Conscience. "He didn't seem inclined to tell me his business beyond
saying that it was important."

"Hagan, Hagan?" repeated the master of the house with brows drawn in
well-simulated perplexity. "I don't seem to recognize the name. Do you
know him?"

"I never saw him before. Shall I send him in?"

"I suppose it might be as well. Some business promoter, I fancy."

But as Conscience left, Tollman's scowl returned.

"Hagan," he repeated with a soft but wrathful voice to himself. "The
blackmailer!"

H