whether they had yet told Mrs. Pethel of
their intention to go on to Switzerland for some climbing.

Of his secretiveness for his wife's sake I had a touching little
instance after luncheon. We had adjourned to have coffee in front of
the hotel. The car was already in attendance, and Peggy had darted off
to make her daily inspection of it. Pethel had given me a cigar, and
his wife presently noticed that he himself was not smoking. He
explained to her that he thought he had smoked too much lately, and
that he was going to "knock it off" for a while. I would not have
smiled if he had met my eye, but his avoidance of it made me quite sure
that he really had been "thinking over" what I had said last night
about nicotine and its possibly deleterious action on the gambling
thrill.

Mrs. Pethel saw the smile that I could not repress. I explained that I
was wishing _I_ could knock off tobacco, and envying her husband's
strength of character. She smiled, too, but wanly, with her eyes on
him.

"Nobody has so much strength of character as he has," she said.

"Nonsense!" he laughed. "I'm the weakest of men."

"Yes," she said quietly; "that's true, too, James."

Again he laughed, but he flushed. I saw that Mrs. Pethel also had
faintly flushed, and I became horribly aware of following suit. In the
sudden glow and silence created by Mrs. Pethel's paradox, I was
grateful to the daughter for bouncing back among us, and asking how
soon we should be ready to start.

Pethel looked at his wife, who looked at me and rather strangely asked
if I was sure I wanted to go with them. I protested that of course I
did. Pethel asked her if SHE really wanted to come.

"You see, dear, there was the run yesterday from Calais. And to-morrow
you'll be on the road again, and all the days after."

"Yes," said Peggy; "I'm SURE you'd much rather stay at home, darling
Mother, and have a good rest."

"Shall we go and put on our things, Peggy?" replied Mrs. Pethel, rising
from her chair. She asked her husband whether he was taking the
chauffeur with him. He said he thought not.

"Oh, hurrah!" cried Peggy. "Then I can be on the front seat!"

"No, dear," said her mother. "I am sure Mr. Beerbohms would like to be
on the front seat."

"You'd like to be with mother, wouldn't you?" the girl appealed. I
replied with all possible emphasis that I should like to be with Mrs.
Pethel. But presently, when the mother and daughter reappeared