ss.

'It isn't every woman could have done it, you know, Mr. Rolfe.'

'It is not,' Harvey assented.

Only those rooms were furnished which the little family used, five or
six in all; two or three stood vacant, and served as playgrounds for
the children in bad weather. Of his relatives at the top, Buncombe
never spoke; he either did not know, or viewed with indifference, the
fact that Mrs. Handover served his lodger in a menial capacity. About
once a month he invited three or four male friends to a set dinner, and
hilarity could be heard until long after midnight. Altogether it was a
strange household, and, as he walked about the streets of the
neighbourhood, Harvey often wondered what abnormalities even more
striking might be concealed behind the meaningless uniformity of these
heavily respectable housefronts. As a lodger he was content to dwell
here; but sometimes by a freak of imagination he pictured himself a
married man, imprisoned with wife and children amid these leagues of
dreary, inhospitable brickwork, and a great horror fell upon him.

No. In his time he had run through follies innumerable, but from the
supreme folly of hampering himself by marriage, a merciful fate had
guarded him. It was probably the most remarkable fact of his life; it
heightened his self-esteem, and appeared to warrant him in the
assurance that a destiny so protective would round the close of his
days with tranquillity and content.

Upon this thought he lay down to rest. For half an hour Basil Morton's
letter had occupied his mind: he had tried to think out the problem it
set forth, not to leave his friend quite unanswered; but weariness
prevailed, and with it the old mood of self-congratulation.

Next morning the weather was fine; that is to say, one could read
without artificial light, and no rain fell, and far above the
house-tops appeared a bluish glimmer, shot now and then with pale
yellowness. Harvey decided to carry out his intention of calling upon
Mrs. Abbott. She lived at Kilburn, and thither he drove shortly before
twelve o'clock. He was admitted to a very cosy room, where, amid books
and pictures, and by a large fire, the lady of the house sat reading.
Whatever the cause, it seemed to him that his welcome fell short of
cordiality, and he hastened to excuse himself for intruding at so early
an hour.

'I received a letter last night which I thought you had better know of
without delay.'

'From that man--Mr. Wager?' said