emanded
an accounting. With her knowledge of her own guilt and her tendency to
introspective brooding, it was only natural that her sensitive nature
suffered atrociously. All day and all night her conscience tortured
her. Incessantly it put the agonizing question: Have you been true,
true to yourself and to the man to whom you gave your word? And always
came the damning answer: "No--I've been false, miserably false, both to
myself and him."

In her quieter moods--the moods she dreaded most--she allowed her mind
to dwell on the past. She wondered what John was doing and where he
was. Had he succeeded or had he failed? For a long time she had
received no word. On leaving Mrs. Farley's, she had left no address and
had taken no pains to have her mail forwarded. No doubt his letters had
been returned to him. Sometimes she regretted having burned the message
of farewell which Brockton had dictated. It would have been fairer,
more honest, to have told him the truth frankly. Brockton had wanted to
do the right thing, and she had lied, making him believe she had done
it.

That was why she despised herself, and that was why she drank
champagne--so she might forget. Sometimes she took too much. One night
Elfie St. Clair celebrated her birthday by giving a supper in her
apartment. It was a jolly gathering, and they made merry until the late
hours of the morning. Laura had been particularly high spirited and
hilarious until, toward the end, her face grew deathly white. Seized
with a sudden dizziness, she had to be wrapped in furs and carried down
to her carriage. Brockton, embarrassed, declared it to be due to the
heat. Everybody present knew it was the champagne.

But gaiety that is forced and only artificially stimulated cannot be
kept up long. One day the reaction inevitably comes, and then the
awakening is terrible, disastrous. At times, when, in company of
others, she was laughing loudly and appearing to be thoroughly enjoying
herself, she would suddenly become serious, talk no more, and go away
in the corner by herself. Her companions teased her about it, and
called such symptoms "Laura's tantrums." The truth was that each day
the girl realized more the hollowness and rottenness of the life she
was leading. She was filled with repulsion and disgust, both for
herself and her associates. While she was weak and luxury-loving, she
was not entirely devoid of character. There was enough sentimentality
and emotion in her moral fi