"I will not agree to it," she answered firmly. "Let me go, Mr.

Gregory, there is no need ever to bring up that subject."

He had risen, and now in blank amazement, he stared at her, repeating, "You will not agree to it? To what? You are unreasonable. What subject have I brought up?"

"It is very true that we have drifted too far apart to be as we were in the beginning. But there is still something left to me, and this something I shall cling to as long as I can. I mean to avoid the publicity, the open exposure, the shame of--of--a neglected wife."

"My G.o.d!" whispered Gregory, falling back, "then somebody has told you about Springfield--it was Fran!"

"I don't know what you mean," she returned, apparently without emotion. "What _I_ mean is, that I shall never consent to a divorce."

"A divorce? Good heavens, Lucy, are you mad? Do you think I want a separation because you disown the church? What have I ever done to make you imagine such an absurdity?"

She answered gently, "Yes, it seems I misunderstood. But you said you wanted me to discuss the future in a matter-of-fact way, and I couldn't think of the future as having any other matter-of-fact solution."

Gregory was hotly indignant. "Lucy, if that is meant as an insinuation against--"

Mrs. Gregory raised her hand compellingly. "Do not speak any name,"

she said, looking at him steadily. "I can endure much," she went on, in a milder tone, finding him silent; "I often wonder if many women could endure as silently--but there must never be a name mentioned between us."

Her manner was so unwontedly final, that he stood looking at her, not knowing how to resume the pressing subject of his past. They were in that same silent att.i.tude when Grace Noir came in from the hall.

Grace turned up the lights, and then--"Oh!" It was impossible to prevent an unpleasant compression of the mouth at discovering Gregory so near his wife. "Am I in the way? I am looking for company, and I heard the door-bell--please excuse me!" she added, biting off the words.

"Of course you are not in the way," Gregory returned desperately.

"Company, you say? And you heard the door-bell--is Bob Clinton--" He grew white. "My eyes are bad, for some reason," he muttered, and switched off the lights again.

"How very dark you have it in here!" said Grace reprovingly. "Of course Mr. Clinton has been shown in the back-parlor, where it is light. I will go to him there, and leave you two--" she paused irresolutely, but neither spoke.

Grace had no sooner gone than Gregory with an effort found his voice.

"Lucy, my conscience has tormented me until it will not let me rest-- about you. It's your right to know something more about my life than I have ever told--"

"Right in there," said the maid's voice, from the hall, and Abbott Ashton and Robert Clinton entered the half-light.

While Robert was greeting Mrs. Gregory with exaggerated pleasure, in order to escape facing her husband, Abbott spoke to the other with an odd sense of meanness, as if he partook, by mere nearness, of the other's cowardice. "I wish to speak to you for a few minutes, Mr.

Gregory."

Gregory, like an animal brought to bay, said, "I suppose you've some excuse about playing cards with Fran."

"More important than playing cards," Abbott returned. He could not meet the eyes of this man he had once highly venerated--it was like beholding an ideal divested of imagined beauty, shivering in the shame of its nakedness.

Gregory fought off the inevitable: "If you refer to losing your position at the public school--"

"No. Clinton has come home from Springfield, and we have a matter--"

"It's pressing business," spoke up Robert, who all this time had been asking Mrs. Gregory if her mother was well, if Simon Jefferson was no worse, if Fran was hearty, if Grace Noir was at home--"and private business."

Abbott looked warningly at his friend to remind him of his promise not to utter a word. Robert, remembering, tightly compressed his lips, and marched over to the piano. He leaned upon it heavily.

"I have no business," Mr. Gregory exclaimed, in fear, "that my wife need not know."

"This is--" cried Robert. Then remembering, he struck the keys a resounding chord.

Mrs. Gregory was about to leave the room.

"No, no!" exclaimed Mr. Gregory, starting to the door to intercept her, "I want you to stay. I'll have no secrets from you, Lucy. I want you to hear what these gentlemen have to say." He glared at Abbott as if daring him to speak the words that must destroy his wife's last feeble hold on her position.

"I hope Mrs. Gregory will excuse us," said Abbott, smiling at her as cheerfully as he could, "but she knows that there are matters of business that women don't understand, or care to learn. This is something that relates merely to you, Mr. Gregory, and ourselves."

"Of course I understand you, Abbott," said Mrs. Gregory gently, "and Mr. Gregory is wrong to insist on my interrupting--women are always in the way--" She smiled, and, slipping around Gregory, had reached the door, when she came face to face with Grace Noir, entering. At sight of her--for Grace did not pause, but went over to the piano--Mrs.

Gregory apparently reconsidered, and stepped to her husband's side.

"So you did come," Grace said, smiling at Robert. "Shall we go into the other room?"

Robert reveled in her beauty, and to that extent his anger against Gregory flamed higher. "Pretty soon," he said, "pretty soon, Miss Grace--in just twenty minutes--" he looked at his watch, then at Abbott.

"I must tell you, Mr. Gregory," Abbott began rapidly, "that I had just thirty minutes to consummate the matter with you,--just half an hour, when we came here, and ten minutes are already gone. Only twenty minutes are left."

"What do you mean by your twenty minutes being left?" Gregory bl.u.s.tered.

Abbott spoke carefully, at the same time drawing a little farther away from the man he despised: "Bob has been to Springfield about that matter, you understand."

"No, I don't," cried Gregory. "Or if I do--tell it out--all of it."

"He has been to Springfield," Abbott went on, "and he got on the inside of the business, and the interests are determined that--that they will retaliate on you for your successes in the past, and at the same time be a help to Bob."

"I don't understand," Gregory gasped blankly.

"Me neither," muttered Robert.

"It's very simple," Abbott maintained. "The Springfield interests want to give you a blow, and give Bob a helping hand. Therefore, you are to transfer your secretary to his store, where a bookkeeper is needed."

"Oh, indeed," interposed Grace Noir icily. "I am a mere p.a.w.n, I presume, to be sent where I am wanted. But I would like to ask Mr.

Clinton if he found out anything about Fran, while he was in Springfield?"

"Fran is all she claims to be," Robert declared bluntly.

"All? You can prove she's no fraud?"

"My pockets are full of proofs," Robert exclaimed, looking significantly at Gregory.

"Dear Fran!" murmured Mrs. Gregory with a sweet smile of reminiscence.

"Abbott," Mr. Gregory gasped, as he began to realize the compromise that was offered, "you have always been my friend--and you have been interested in my charities--you know how important my secretary is to my work. It is true that I did wrong, years ago--very wrong--it is true that I bitterly--what shall I say?--antagonized the interests at Springfield. But that was so long ago. Am I to be punished now--"

"Mr. Gregory," said Abbott, clearly and forcibly, "I have nothing to do with any punishment, I have nothing to do with demanding the release of your secretary. I am a mere agent of the interests, sent to you to demand that your secretary be dismissed in the morning; and if you can not see your way to promise me now that you will dismiss her, my office is ended. If you can promise to send her away, I give you my word the transactions shall be for ever hushed up, so far as we are concerned. If you can not promise, all will be revealed at once."

"In just ten minutes," said Robert Clinton, consulting his watch.