he scene. Things had been going badly for a couple of days
and the old man had been seriously overworked. He had not listened to
the warnings of Tarboe, or to the hints thrown out by his own punished
physique. He was not a man to take hints. Everything that vexed his life
roused opposition. This Tarboe knew, but he also knew that the business
must suffer, if the old man suffered.

When John Grier left the office it was with head bowed and mind
depressed. Nothing had happened to cause him grave anxiety, yet he had
been below par for several hours. Why was he working so hard? Why was
life to him such a concentration? Why did he seek for more money and to
get more power? To whom could it go? Not to Fabian; not to his wife.
To Tarboe--well, there was not enough in that! This man had only lately
come into his life, and was only near to him in a business sense. Carnac
was near in every sense that really mattered, and Carnac was out of it
all.

He was not loved, and in his heart of hearts he knew it, but he had had
his own way, and he loved himself. No one seemed to care for him, not
even his wife. How many years was it since they had roomed together?
Yet as he went towards his own home now, he recalled the day they were
married, and for the first time had drawn as near to each other as life
could draw. He had thought her wonderful then, refined, and oh! so rich
in life's gifts. His love had almost throttled her. She was warm and
bountiful and full of temperament. So it went for three years, and
then slowly he drew away from her until at last, returning from the
backwoods, he had gone to another room, and there had stayed. Very
occasionally he had smothered her with affection, but that had passed,
until now, middle-aged, she seemed to be not a room away from him, but a
thousand rooms away. He saw it with no reproach to himself. He forgot it
was he who had left her room, and had set up his own tabernacle, because
his hours differed from hers, and because she tossed in her bed at
nights, and that made him restless too.

Yet, if his love had been the real thing, he would have stayed, because
their lives were so similar, and the rules of domestic life in French
Canada were so fixed. He had spoiled his own household, destroyed his
own peace, forsaken his own nest, outlived his hope and the possibility
of further hope, except more business success, more to leave behind him.

That was the stern truth. Had he been a different man t