door,
meaning--as he said to himself roughly--to "get the thing over." But he
paused with his hand on the knob. He thought that he heard a woman's
voice saying: "May I come in?"

His muttered comment upon one of his and Beverley's guests, whom he
supposed the intruder to be, was far from flattering. Perhaps, however,
it would be well not to find his wife alone. He would give Beverley a
few minutes more, to be sure that her dress was on, before he went to
interrupt the chorus of mutual admiration; but no woman's presence
should prevent him from asking the question he meant to ask--"Where are
your pearls?"

At exactly eight minutes to eight Roger ceased his restless tramp up and
down the room, and stopped again at the door. Before he could open it,
however, there was a light tap--a tap like Beverley's in happier days.
"Can she mean, after all, to tell me the truth?" he wondered; and he
heard his voice saying mechanically, "Come in."

Beverley came in; Roger's room was full of light, and as his wife
entered she faced it. She glittered from head to foot like an ice maiden
under a blazing sun. She wore a wreath of diamond roses; round her waist
was a girdle of diamonds with long tasselled ends; on her white satin
shoes were diamond buckles; and over her bare, white neck, her young
gauze-enfolded bosom, hung the rope of the queen's pearls.

"I thought you were coming in to see me dressed?" she said calmly. "Did
you forget?"

For answer Roger stared. He stepped back into the room, and let Beverley
shut the door. She stood before him smiling, though, if he had analyzed
her smile, he would have said that it was sad. "How do you think I
look?" she asked, when he did not speak. "I hope you're not
disappointed?"

"You have had those pearls copied!" he flung at her.

Beverley blushed bright crimson. She understood instantly what he meant
and thought, but she had not gone through tortures and been relieved at
the last moment to be beaten down now.

"What do you mean?" she asked, her eyes steady, her head up.

"You thought I didn't know. But I have known from the first. I found out
by accident. I always hoped you'd some day tell me the truth. This is a
cowardly thing you've done."

Beverley was again ivory pale. "Are you a judge of pearls, Roger?" she
coldly inquired.

"Yes," he said.

She lifted the rope over her head and thrust it, against his will, into
his hands. "Make any test you wish, and decide whether these ar