f way."

The architect, still moving about the room with slow restlessness,
stopped short and cast a quick, suspicious glance at the physician.
The sweat broke out on his forehead as the fear leaped into his heart
that Dr. Annister had guessed the truth. He had to grope among his
panic thoughts for a moment before he could reply. His voice was a
little strained as he said:

"Meet you half way? I don't know what you mean?"

Dr. Annister leaned back in his chair and sighed. But his searching
gray eyes did not leave the other's face nor fail to take note there
of the frequent signs of inner perturbation. Sadly he was saying to
himself that everything in Brand's expression and manner increased his
fears and justified his suspicion.

"Well, then," he said, "let us come straight to the point. A look, an
expression, a tell-tale sign that I don't like has been steadily
growing stronger in your face for the last six months. For the
physician, and especially for the one who deals as much as I do with
the psychological results of misliving, a man's countenance becomes a
veritable table of contents for the book of his life. And your face is
beginning to tell me such a story of self-indulgence and sensuality as
makes me unwilling to give my daughter to your arms."

Brand turned a little away, as if he would conceal the traitor face
whose refined beauty this inquisitor was finding even less than skin
deep. "Of course," he said, "I am not as innocent as I was a dozen
years ago. But--what you would have, Dr. Annister? A saint? You know
you would have to look far to find one among modern young men. I'm no
worse than the most of them and much better than some."

The physician was leaning forward again in his chair, his finger-tips
tapping. He paid no attention to his companion's defense but pursued
his own line of thought with an increasing tensity in his voice.

"I have been watching that revealing table of contents in your face
grow steadily plainer for the last six months. After each of these
long absences, for which you can give no satisfactory explanation, the
expression has become, to my eyes, stronger and more significant than
before. It forces me to the hypothesis, almost to the conclusion, that
you have been spending this time somewhere in the under-world, in some
sort of secret debauch."

Brand wiped the starting beads of sweat from his brow, and said, "I
don't believe you really think me that sort of man, Dr. Annister