terraces took a lot of space. Each one meant so much
rent was lost. For years, till the plan took hold of the town, it was a
money loser. . . . And Joe met your sister then." The voice had
changed, and its hostile tone brought Ethel back with a sharp turn. The
man, as though uneasy at the revelations he had made, was looking at her
as at first, with suspicion and dislike. "I won't go into details of
how she got her hold on Joe. You know how that's done, I suppose. I'm
speaking of the effect on his work. He soon put off that plan of
his--and any others of the kind. For now he had to have money. And he
has been putting it off ever since--not dropping it, he'll tell you,
only putting it off till he's rich. But if he isn't rich enough soon,
it'll be too late. For that part of him is nearly dead.

"But to go back to your sister. It was not only his money, it was his
time she needed. First it was a wedding trip, and after that late
hours--a short day in his office. And he wasn't half the man he had
been. He was thinking of the night before, and then of the night that
was coming. She came for him at five o'clock." He saw Ethel start, and
he added, "Just as you did later on.

"And when he did wake up to work, it was different--it was for money
alone. He began to throw over his ideals, and very soon there was only
me to hold him back. You see, he had had so many friends before he met
your sister, men and even women, too, who had been a spur to him. But
when he brought his wife around, they wouldn't have her, turned her
down--and that made her bitter against them all and she kept Joe from
them. All but me. I stayed in the office, and now and then I got some
of his friends and we would take him out to lunch. But then even that
stopped. Joe hadn't time. He was too busy getting the cash.

"He had dropped all pretence of any work that was really worth while,
and had turned his art into a business. He became a real estate gambler
and an architect, all in one. He got to speculating in land--and what
he built on it he didn't care, so long as it produced the cash. Oh, it
wasn't all at once, you know, you can't strangle the soul of a man in a
hurry--but by the time your sister died, the buildings Joe was putting
up were just about as common and cheap as the average play on
Broadway--crowd pleasers. He had lost his nerve. Everything had to be
popular. Play safe each time, on the same old flats that every woman
seems to love. A woman is c