dressed, sent for coffee, gained the pathetic victory of swallowing it.
His face, seared by all the inner fires of that night, settled now to a
look of steel resolution. He rose from his coffee, opened his desk and
wrote this note:

MY DEAR MME. LE GRANGE:

I understand perfectly your motive in asking me to invade a private
house and peep through a keyhole. It was the only thing which would
have disillusioned me. Had you told me this, I would not have
believed you. Though it was harsh treatment, I thank you. I enclose
a check for a hundred dollars, payment two weeks in advance for
your services, which I shall need no longer. You did your job well.
You will understand, I think, that I do not reflect on you when I
ask you never to see me again. You would recall something which I
shall try for the rest of my life to forget.

WALTER H. BLAKE.

P.S. Do as you please about this--but I should prefer you to give
Mrs. Markham the customary notice.

As he sealed the letter and put on his hat that he might go to post it
with his own hands, he had the look of a man who has settled everything
and for life. But the clanging lid of the letter box had no sooner
closed than the look of resolution began to leave his face. For two
hours, he paced the streets of Manhattan. He found himself at length
apostrophizing a brick wall, "Who could believe it?" And again, to a
lamp-post, "I can't believe it!" And again, "She made her!" He wheeled
on this, turned into a drug store, shut himself into the telephone
booth, and called up the Markham house.

After an eternal minute, he was answered in Annette's own deep,
thrilling contralto:

"Hello!"

He paused, controlled his voice, and plunged in:

"Miss Markham, this is Dr. Blake. Please don't go away from the
telephone. You owe it to me to listen--"

"I shall listen--"

"Very well. You will remember that I have respected your wishes about
keeping away from you. I do not want to make you any trouble. But
something has happened in which you are concerned, and which makes it
imperative that I should speak to you face to face for five minutes--"

"Something important?" he heard her voice tremble. He remembered then
that cheated and humiliated lovers had been known to shoot women; he
had raised his voice; perhaps, what with her bad conscience, she was
thinking of that.

"Understand me," he added, speaking lower. "I shall be kind. I shal