the corner of her square, "you put it well when
you said 'love enough.' You see that's the whole thing, Mr. Bulstrode,
to love enough. One can, of course, in that case, do nearly all there
is to do, can't one?"

"Nearly all," he had smiled, and added: "_And a great deal more_."

The household gods, whose dignity and harmony had not been disturbed
during the absence of the master of Westboro', were unable, however, to
give him very much comfort on his return. The Duke's motor cut quickly
up the long drive and severed--clove, as it were--a way through the
frosty air and let him into the park. The poor man had only a sense of
wretchedness on coming home--"coming back," he now put it. Huddled
down deep in his fur coat, its collar hunched round his ears, his face
was as gloomy as that of a man dispossessed of all his goods; doors
thrown open into the fragrant and agreeably warmed halls fetched him
further home. But the knowledge that the house had been lived in
during his absence was not ungrateful. He sniffed the odor of a
familiar brand of cigar, and before he had quite plumbed the melancholy
of the place to its depths, Jimmy Bulstrode had sunned out of one of
the inner rooms, and the grasp of the friendly hand and the sound of
the cheerful voice struck a chord in Westboro' that shook him.

"I've been like a fiend possessed," he said to Jimmy, in the evening
when they found themselves once more before the fire. "I've scarcely
known what I've been doing, or why; but I know one thing, and that is
that I'm the most wretched man alive."

Bulstrode nodded. "You _did_ go to Paris, then!"

"Yes," said the Duke, "and what I've found out there has driven me
insane."

Although ignorant of the variations of his friend's discovery,
Bulstrode was pretty certain of one that had not been made.

"You may, old chap," he said smoothly, "not have found out all the
truth, you know."

Westboro' raised his hand. "Come," he said, "no palliations; you can't
smooth over the facts. Frances is not in Paris. She has not been in
Paris for several months." He paused.

"In itself not a tragedy," murmured his friend. "Paris is considered
at times a place as well _not_ to be in."

But Bulstrode's remark did not distract his friend from his narrative.

"She has not been in Paris since I saw her twelve months ago, and she
has left no sign or trace of where she has gone. There is no address,
no way that I can find her. Not that