the man who was sitting at the writing-table had not raised his head for half an hour from between his hands.

when at last he lifted his face, after a third knock upon the door, the prints of his fingers were branded across its grayness in livid streaks.

the hall-boy who entered, after waiting vainly for permission, handed him a telegram, which he opened and spread out on the desk before him.

he stared at it blankly, with his temples upon his wrists, until the boy, tired of waiting, asked if there were any answer.

terence turned and looked at him as though unable to account for his presence.

the boy repeated his question, and terence shook his head, resting it again upon his hands as the door closed upon the messenger, gazing down uncomprehendingly upon the thin pink sheet.

presently, however, the meaning of what lay before him filtered into his consciousness. it was an invitation of no moment, but it needed a reply. he drew out a sheaf of forms from a pigeon-hole, wrote a refusal, rang for the boy, and sent it off.

the incident passed at once from his mind, but it had disturbed his absorption.

he rose and paced slowly and aimlessly about the room, gazing blindly out of the window and at the engravings upon the walls. there was something curious in the combined looseness and stiffness of his movements: he seemed literally to be dragging himself about.

when he sat down again he turned his chair slightly from the table, and leaning back in it, stared out at the gray day with a look of dazed pain upon his face.

so he remained while an hour went over; as still, as empty, as a deserted house.

then, with a deeper breath and the same confused slowness in his movements, he drew an envelope from his pocket, and spread out the sheet within it upon the desk. the lines it carried covered but a single page, and he had read them through a dozen times.

they came from a woman whom he had loved more than his own soul, and they cast him, with freezing contempt, out of her sight for ever.

he read the bitter words again, hoping their sharp edge would make a wound of self-respect in the consciousness they had benumbed. but he tried in vain to hurt his pride, or by any fresh vexation to escape from the torment of his thoughts.

earth is jealous of its anodynes, even of pain that brings oblivion or of death that means release. he refolded the letter and returned it to his pocket, knowing that in half an hour he would be reading it again.

meanwhile a new impulse moved him.

leaning forward, he slid back a secret door in the top of his desk, and took from the space behind it a bundle of letters. they were in envelopes of almost every hue and shape, but all were directed by the same hand, in a vain weak sprawling character.

terence drew the packet towards him, and set his fingers on the string.

then with a shudder he pushed it from him, and thrust his face into his hands.

under those harlequin covers were hidden the one chance of happiness for his life, and the reputation of a woman.

he could make them yield which of the two he chose; but the other must be destroyed.