appreciated that "How do, Morton"--greeting at last of a man for a man
instead of a man for a servant or a former servant; nor was Lambert's
call to his sister without a significance nearly sharp enough to hurt.

"Sylvia! Didn't you meet this strong-armed Princetonian at Betty's dance
a year ago?"

George understood that she had no such motives as Lambert's for altering
her attitude, so much more uncompromising from the beginning than his.
There had been no contact or shared pain. Only what she might have
observed from a remote stand that Saturday could have affected her. How
would she respond now?

She advanced slowly, at first bewildered, then angry. But Blodgett had
nothing but his money to recommend him to her. She wouldn't, George was
certain, bare any intimacies of emotion before him.

"I rather think I did."

In her eyes George recognized the challenge he had last seen there.

"Thanks for remembering me," he said rather in Wandel's manner.

"A week ago Saturday----" she began, uncertainly, as though her
remembering needed an apology.

"Who could forget the great Morton?" Lambert laughed. "With a broken
head he beat Yale. That was a hard game to lose."

"I'd heard," she said, indifferently, "that you had been hurt."

George would have preferred words as ugly and unforgettable as those she
had attacked him with the day of her accident. She turned to Blodgett.
George had an instinct to shake her as she chatted easily and casually,
glancing at him from time to time. He could have borne it better if she
hadn't included him at all.

He was glad her brother occupied him. Lambert was for dissecting each
play of the game, and he made no attempt to hide the admiration for
George it had aroused. He gave the impression that he knew very well men
didn't do such things--particularly that little trick with
Goodhue--unless they were the right sort.

Blodgett said something about tea. They strolled into the house. A fire
burned in the great hall. That was the only light. George came last,
directly after Sylvia.

"So you're a friend of Mr. Blodgett's!" she said with an intonation
intended to hurt.

"I wouldn't have expected," he answered, easily, "to find you a caller
here."

She paused and faced him. Lights from the distant fire got as far as her
face, disclosing her contempt. He wouldn't let her speak.

"I won't have you think I had anything to do with bringing you. I never
guessed until I saw your brother