ge,
and clothe his exit with everlasting sadness. There was no help for it.
Many souls more loving suffered a similar anguish, and survived it. It
astonished and even appalled him, if anything could now appal him, that
only two out of the group of his close friends and near acquaintances
seemed near enough in affection and intimacy to mourn his loss. Not
one of twenty others would lose a dinner or a fraction of appetite
because he had vanished so pitifully. How rarer than diamonds is that
jewel of friendship!

He had thought once that a hundred friends would have wept bitter tears
over his sorrow; of the number there were left only two!

It was easy for him to leave the old life, now become so hateful; but
there was terror in putting on the new, to which he must ally himself as
if born into it, like a tree uprooted from its native soil and planted
far from its congenial elements in the secret, dark, sympathetic places
of the earth. He must cut himself off more thoroughly than by death. The
disappearance must be eternal, unless death removed Sonia Westfield
before circumstances made return practically impossible; his experience
of life showed that disagreeable people rarely die while the microbe of
disagreeableness thrives in them.

What would be the effect of his disappearance on Sonia and her lover?
The question brought a smile to his wan face. She had married his name
and his money, and would lose both advantages. He would take his
property into exile to the last penny. His name without his income would
be a burden to her. His disappearance would cast upon her a reproach,
unspoken, unseen, a mere mist enwrapping her fatally, but not to be
dispelled. Her mouth would be shut tight; no chance for innuendoes, lest
hint might add suspicion to mystery. She would be forced to observe the
proprieties to the letter, and the law would not grant her a divorce for
years. In time she would learn that her only income was the modest
revenue from her own small estate; that he had taken all with him into
darkness; and still she would not dare to tell the damaging fact to her
friends. She would be forced to keep up appearances, to spend money in a
vain search for him, or his wealth; suspecting much yet knowing nothing,
miserably certain that he was living somewhere in luxury, and enjoying
his vengeance.

He no longer thought of vengeance. He did not desire it. The mills of
the gods grind out vengeance enough to glut any appetite. B