of a man
of whom he had suddenly become horribly afraid.

And at last Selwyn, emerging from his pallid reverie, straightened out,
shaking his broad shoulders as though to free him of that black spectre
perching there.

"Ruthven," he said, "a few years ago you persuaded my wife to leave me;
and I have never punished you. There were two reasons why I did not: the
first was because I did not wish to punish her, and any blow at you
would have reached her heavily. The second reason, subordinate to the
first, is obvious: decent men, in these days, have tacitly agreed to
suspend a violent appeal to the unwritten law as a concession to
civilisation. This second reason, however, depends entirely upon the
first, as you see."

He leaned back in his chair thoughtfully, and recrossed his legs.

"I did not ask you into this room," he said, with a slight smile, "to
complain of the wrong you have committed against me, or to retail to you
the consequences of your act as they may or may not have affected me and
my career; I have--ah--invited you here to explain to you the present
condition of your own domestic affairs"--he looked at Ruthven full in
the face--"to explain them to you, and to lay down for you the course of
conduct which you are to follow."

"By God!--" began Ruthven, stepping back, one hand reaching for the
door-knob; but Selwyn's voice rang out clean and sharp:

"Sit down!"

And, as Ruthven glared at him out of his little eyes:

"You'd better sit down, I think," said Selwyn softly.

Ruthven turned, took two unsteady steps forward, and laid his heavily
ringed hand on the back of a chair. Selwyn smiled, and Ruthven sat down.

"Now," continued Selwyn, "for certain rules of conduct to govern you
during the remainder of your wife's lifetime. . . . And your wife is
ill, Mr. Ruthven--sick of a sickness which may last for a great many
years, or may be terminated in as many days. Did you know it?"

Ruthven snarled.

"Yes, of course you knew it, or you suspected it. Your wife is in a
sanitarium, as you have discovered. She is mentally ill--rational at
times--violent at moments, and for long periods quite docile, gentle,
harmless--content to be talked to, read to, advised, persuaded. But
during the last week a change of a certain nature has occurred
which--which, I am told by competent physicians, not only renders her
case beyond all hope of ultimate recovery, but threatens an earlier
termination than was at first loo