hat night, feeling my brain alight and blazing with a
fire of agony and pain. Sleep was out of the question. A man does not
love a woman as I loved Viola and sleep the night after she has left
him.

The next morning I went to her bankers, only to get just the answers I
had expected.

Yes, Mrs. Lonsdale had communicated with them. She was abroad, and
they had her address but were not at liberty to disclose it. They
would forward all letters to her immediately.

I went straight back to my rooms and wrote to her. I poured out my
whole heart in the letter, imploring her to come to me; yet every line
I wrote I knew was useless, useless.

Still I could not rest nor exist till I had written it, and when it
was posted I felt a certain solace.

I walked on to my club afterwards, and amongst other letters found
another from Suzee.

I could not imagine how she had obtained my club address at all,
unless it was in that night when she came to my cabin. She would be
quite capable of searching for anything she wanted and taking away
some of my letters to obtain and keep my address.

I did not open it at once. I felt a sort of anger with Suzee as being
partly responsible for all I was going through. Whatever Viola might
say, Suzee's letter had seemed to bring her mad resolve to a climax.

I took some lunch at the club, and a man I knew came up and spoke to
me.

"Up in town again, I see," he began, to which I assented.

"How's Mrs. Lonsdale?"

"Quite well, thank you," I replied.

"Is she up with you?"

"No."

"Coming up soon, I suppose?"

"I don't know."

My friend looked at me once or twice, and then after a few vacuous
remarks went away.

I knew that in a few hours it would be all over the club that I and
Viola no longer hit it off together, that in fact we were living
apart, and by the evening a decree _nisi_ would have been pronounced
for us. But I didn't care what they said. Nothing mattered. No one
could hurt me more than I was hurt already. The worst had happened.

As I sat there I saw Lawton, who also belonged to the club, cross the
end of the dining-room. He, too, would come up and speak to me if he
caught sight of me.

I felt I did not wish to speak to the man who had always loved Viola,
who had always envied me her possession, and to whom once I had nearly
lost her.

I got up and left the club, went back to my rooms, and there got out
my letters to read.

After all, I thought, as I took up Suzee