ent on, "that we're to be together. I've
wanted it for a long time. You must know that."

She gave him an uncomfortable sense of being captive, of seeking blindly
any course to freedom.

"I no longer know anything about you. I don't care to know."

Lambert and Dalrymple strolled in. Dalrymple opened the cage. George
moved away, aching to prevent such interference by any means he could.
His emotion made him uneasy. To what resolution were his relations with
Dalrymple drifting? How far was he capable of going to keep the other in
his place?

He stood by the mantel, speaking only when it was necessary and then
without consciousness, his whole interest caught by the picture
Dalrymple and Sylvia made, close together by the centre table in the
soft light of a reading lamp.

A servant entered with cocktails. George's interest sharpened. Betty
took hers with the others. Only Sylvia and Dalrymple shook their heads.
Clearly it was an understanding between them--a little denial of hers to
make his infinitely greater one less difficult. She smiled up at him,
indeed, comprehendingly; but George's glance didn't waver from
Dalrymple, and it caught an increase in the other's restlessness, a
following nearly hypnotic, by thoughtful eyes, of the tray with the
little glasses as it passed around the room. George relaxed. He was
conscious enough of Blodgett's bellow:

"Here's to the blushing bride!"

What lack of taste! But how much greater the lack of taste that restless
inheritor exposed! Couldn't even join a formal toast, didn't dare
probably, or was it that he only dared not risk it in public, in front
of Sylvia? And she pandered to his weakness, smiled upon it as if it
were an epic strength. He was sufficiently glad now that Dalrymple had
got into him for so much money.

IV

For George dinner was chiefly a sea of meaningless chatter continually
ruffled by the storm of Blodgett's voice.

"Your brother tells me," he said to Sylvia, "that you're irritating
yourself with socialism."

She looked at him with a little interest then.

"I've been reading. It's quite extraordinary. Odd I should have lived so
long without really knowing anything about such things."

"Not odd at all," George contradicted her. "I should call it odd that
you find any interest in them now. Why do you?"

"One has to occupy one's mind," she answered.

He glanced at her. Why did she have to occupy herself with matter she
couldn't possibly understan