him to go away again was the end to
be attained. It was with this in view, as well as with a measure of
compassion, that she said:

"You poor Claude! You _have_ been through things, haven't you?"

The answer came laconically: "Been in hell."

"Yes, that's what I thought," she agreed, simply. "I thought it the
instant you came round the corner this afternoon. But why? For what
reason--exactly?"

He lifted his haunted face, stammering out his recital in a way that
reminded her of Thor. She could see that he had profited by his mistake
of a few minutes earlier, and that just as Thor had tried to tell
Claude's story without involving his own, so Claude was endeavoring to
spare her by doing the same thing. Being able to supply the blanks more
accurately now than on the former occasion, she found a kind of
poignant, torturing amusement in fitting her knowledge in.

He began with his first meeting with Rosie, describing the scene. He had
not taken the adventure seriously, not any more than he had taken a
dozen similar. Girls like that could generally be thrown off as easily
as they were taken on, and they bore you no ill-will for the change. As
a matter of fact, a new flirtation generally began where the old one
ended, which made part of the fun for the girl as for the man. He was
speaking of respectable girls, Lois was to understand--village girls,
shop girls, and others of the higher wage-earning variety, who didn't
mind showing a spice of devil before they married and settled down. Lots
of them didn't, and were no worse for it in the end. It had not occurred
to him that Rosie would be different from others of the class, or that
she would take in deadly earnest what was no more than play for him.

When he had made this discovery he had tried to withdraw, but only with
the result of becoming involved more deeply. Over the processes by which
he was led finally to pledge himself he grew incoherent, as also over
the signs which caused him to suspect that Rosie was playing fast and
loose with him. His mutterings as to "somebody else who was in love with
her" and who was "ready to put up money" threw her back on memories of
his uneasy questions concerning Thor on the evenings after the return
from the honeymoon. It was with a sense of the key slipping into the
lock that she said:

"And that made you jealous?"

"As the devil. It was because it did that I knew I couldn't give her
up--that I'd never let her go."

There wa