ely, drew it back before she had the
chance to refuse it. For he felt that she would refuse it. He said, "You
know you can rely on me."

"But I don't need anybody," replied she. "Good-by."

"If I can do anything----"

"Pat will telephone." She was already halfway upstairs.

He found Pat in the front yard, and arranged with him to get news and to
send messages by way of the drug store at the corner, so that she would
know nothing about it. He went to a florist's in New York and sent
masses of flowers. And then--there was nothing more to do. He stopped in
at the club and drank and gambled until far into the morning. He fretted
gloomily about all the next day, riding alone in the Park, driving with
his sister, drinking and gambling at the club again and smiling
cynically to himself at the covert glances his acquaintances exchanged.
He was growing used to those glances. He cared not the flip of a penny
for them.

On the third day came the funeral, and he went. He did not let his
cabman turn in behind the one carriage that followed the hearse. At the
graveyard he stood afar off, watching her in her simple new black,
noting her calm. She seemed thinner, but he thought it might be simply
her black dress. He could see no change in her face. As she was leaving
the grave, she looked in his direction but he was uncertain whether she
had seen him. Pat and Molly were in the big, gloomy looking carriage
with her.

He ventured to go to the front gate an hour later. Pat came out. "It's
no use to go in, Mr. Norman," he said. "She'll not see you. She's shut
up in her own room."

"Hasn't she cried yet, Pat?"

"Not yet. We're waiting for it, sir. We're afraid her mind will give
way. At least, Molly is. I don't think so. She's a queer young lady--as
queer as she looks--though at first you'd never think it. She's always
looking different. I never seen so many persons in one."

"Can't Molly _make_ her cry?--by talking about him?"

"She's tried, sir. It wasn't no use. Why, Miss Dorothy talks about him
just as if he was still here." Pat wiped the sweat from his forehead.
"I've been in many a house of mourning, but never through such a strain
as this. Somehow I feel as if I'd never before been round where there
was anyone that'd lost somebody they _really_ cared about. Weeping and
moaning don't amount to much beside what she's doing."

Norman stayed round for an hour or more, then rushed away distracted. He
drank like a madman--dra