“I’m afraid not, Bob.”

The man pondered silently.  “I suppose if I were the right sort,” he said, at length, with some difficulty, “I’d let you go under these circumstances.  Well, I’m not the right sort; I’m not big or noble.  I’m just an ordinary, medium-sized man, and I’m going to keep you.  However, I’m through side-stepping; I’ve tried to outrun the Barleycorn Brothers, but it’s no use, so I’m going to turn and face them.  If they lick me I’ll go under.  But if I go under I’ll take you with me.  I won’t give you up.  I won’t!”

“I sha’n’t let you pull me down,” she told him, soberly.

“Then you’ll have to bear me up.  When a man’s drowning he grabs and holds on.  That’s me!  There’s nothing fine about me, understand?  I’m human and selfish.  I’d be happy in hell with you.”

“You’re not fair.”

“I don’t pretend to be.  This isn’t a bridge game; this is life.  I’ll cheat, I’ll hold out, I’ll deal from the bottom, if I can’t win in any other way.  Good God!  Don’t you understand that you’re the only thing I ever loved, the only thing I ever wanted and couldn’t get?  I’ve never had but half of you; don’t expect me to give that up.”  He rose, jammed his hat upon his head as if to escape from the room, then turned and crushed his wife to him with a fierce cruelty of possession.  Lorelei could feel him shaking as he covered her face with kisses, but nothing within her stirred even faintly in answer to his passion.

When Bob reached the financial district that day and resumed his quest for work he was ablaze with resentment at himself and at the world in general.

He took up the search with a dogged determination that was quite unlike him.  One after another he canvassed his friends for a position, and finally, as if ill fortune could not withstand his fervor, he was successful.  It was not much of a job that was offered him, but he snapped at it, and returned home that evening in the best of humor.  Already the serious issues of the morning were but a memory; he burst in upon Lorelei like a gale, shouting: 

“I’m chalk-boy at Crosset & Meyers, so you can give Bergman your notice to-night.”

“What’s the salary?”

“It isn’t a salary; it’s a humiliation—­twenty-five a week is the total insult.”

“Why, Bob!  That won’t keep two and the family—­”

“Damn the family!” He quieted himself with an effort.  “Well, you give your notice, anyhow.  I’ll spear the coin for both establishments somehow.  Come!  I insist.  I want to be able to shave myself without blushing.”

Lorelei’s objections were not easily overcome, but at last, in view of the fact that the summer run of the Revue was drawing to a close and the show would soon take to the road, she allowed herself to be persuaded.

Throughout the next week Bob Wharton really tried to make good.  He was enthusiastic; the excitement of actual accomplishment was so novel that he had not time to think of liquor.  When Saturday came and he found himself in possession of honestly earned funds he felt a soul-satisfying ease.  He decided to invest his first savings in a present for Lorelei, then a graver sense of responsibility seized him, and he wrote to Mrs. Knight as follows: