lists; suffering and disaster, which drew their humble contributions from the struggling poor and middle classes, left him unmoved and his check book unopened.  In an age when huge gifts on behalf of charity was the fashionable road to the peerage, his attitude was all the more noticeable.  He would give a thousand pounds for a piece of Sevres china which took his fancy; he would not give a thousand farthings to ease the sufferings of his fellows.  Yet there were few found to criticize him.  He was called original, a crank; there were even some who professed to see merit in his attitude.  To both criticism and praise he was alike indifferent.  With a cynicism with seemed only to become more bitter he pursued his undeviating and deliberate way.

One morning he met Lady Ruth on the pavement in Bond Street.  She pointed to the vacant seat in her landau.

“Get in, please, for a few minutes,” she said.  “I want to talk to you.  I will take you where you like.”

They drove off in silence.

“You were not at the Wavertons’ last night,” he remarked.

“No!” she answered quietly.  “I was not asked.”

He glanced at her questioningly.

“I thought that you were so friendly,” he said.

“I was,” she answered.  “Lady Waverton scarcely knows me now!  It is the beginning of the end, I suppose.”

“You are a little enigmatical this morning,” he declared.

“Oh, no!  You understand me very well,” she answered.  “Everybody knows that it is you who keep us going.  Lumley has not got quite used to taking your money.  He has lost nearly all his ambition.  Soon his day will have gone by.  People shrug their shoulders when they speak of us.  Two years ago the Wavertons were delighted to know me.  Society seems big, but it isn’t.  There are no end of little sets, one inside the other.  Two years ago, I was in the innermost, today I’m getting towards the outside edge.  Look at me!  Do you see any change?”

He scrutinized her mercilessly in the cold morning light.

“You look older,” he said, “and you have begun to use rouge, which is a pity.”

She laughed hardly.

“You think so?  Well, I don’t want Emily to see my hollow cheeks—­or you!  Are you satisfied, Wingrave?”

“I am afraid I don’t understand—­” he began.

“Don’t lie,” she interrupted curtly.  “You do understand.  This is your vengeance—­very subtle and very crafty.  Everything has turned out exactly as you planned.  You have broken us, Wingrave!  I thought myself a clever woman, but I might as well have tried to gamble with the angels.  Why don’t you finish it off now—­make me run away with you?”

“It would bore us both,” he answered calmly.  “Besides, you wouldn’t come!”

“I should, and you know that I would,” she answered.  “Everyone expects it of us.  I think myself that it would be more decent.”

He looked at her thoughtfully.