in their folly. The old cruel
dominance of the man over the woman thing, which had seemed the mere
natural working of the law among men of his race in centuries past, was
awake in him, amid the limitations of modern days.

"My God," he said to himself more than once, "I would like to have
had her in my hands a few hundred years ago. Women were kept in their
places, then."

He was even frenzied enough to think over what he would have done, if
such a thing had been--of her utter helplessness against that which
raged in him--of the grey thickness of the walls where he might
have held and wrought his will upon her--insult, torment, death. His
alcohol-excited brain ran riot--but, when it did its foolish worst, he
was baffled by one thing.

"Damn her!" he found himself crying out. "If I had hung her up and
cut her into strips she would have died staring at me with her big
eyes--without uttering a sound."

There was a long reach between his imaginings and the time he lived
in. America had not been discovered in those decent days, and now a
man could not beat even his own wife, or spend her money, without being
meddled with by fools. He was thinking of a New York young woman of the
nineteenth century who could actually do as she hanged pleased, and who
pleased to be damned high and mighty. For that reason in itself it was
incumbent upon a man to get even with her in one way or another. High
and mightiness was not the hardest thing to reach. It offered a good
aim.

His temper when he returned to Stornham was of the order which in past
years had set Rosalie and her child shuddering and had sent the servants
about the house with pale or sullen faces. Betty's presence had the
odd effect of restraining him, and he even told her so with sneering
resentment.

"There would be the devil to pay if you were not here," he said. "You
keep me in order, by Jove! I can't work up steam properly when you watch
me."

He himself knew that it was likely that some change would take place.
She would not stay at Stornham and she would not leave his wife and
child alone with him again. It would be like her to hold her tongue
until she was ready with her infernal plans and could spring them on
him. Her letters to her father had probably prepared him for such action
as such a man would be likely to take. He could guess what it would be.
They were free and easy enough in America in their dealings with the
marriage tie. Their idea would doubtles