every human mind to desire, to grasp, and to hold.  With a perception swifter than any he had experienced, he realized the certain respite to be gained by yielding to his impulse.  He looked at Chilcote with his haggard, anxious expression, his eager, restless eyes; and a vision of himself followed sharp upon his glance.  A vision of the untiring labor of the past ten days, of the slowly kindling ambition, of the supremacy all but gained.  Then, as the picture completed itself, he lifted his hand with an abrupt movement and dropped the five tabloids one after another into the glass.

XXV

Having taken a definite step in any direction, it was not in Loder’s nature to wish it retraced.  His face was set, but set with determination, when he closed the outer door of his own rooms and passed quietly down the stairs and out into the silent court.  The thought of Chilcote, his pitiable condition, his sordid environments, were things that required a firm will to drive into the background of the imagination; but a whole inferno of such visions would not have daunted Loder on that morning as, unobserved by any eyes, he left the little court-yard with its grass, its trees, its pavement—­all so distastefully familiar—­and passed down the Strand towards life and action.

As he walked, his steps increased in speed and vigor.  Now, for the first time, he fully appreciated the great mental strain that he had undergone in the past ten days—­the unnatural tension; the suppressed, but perpetual, sense of impending recall; the consequently high pressure at which work, and even existence, had been carried on.  And as he hurried forward the natural reaction to this state of things came upon him in a flood of security and confidence—­a strong realization of the temporary respite and freedom for which no price would have seemed too high.  The moment for which he had unconsciously lived ever since Chilcote’s first memorable proposition was within reach at last—­safeguarded by his own action.

The walk from Clifford’s Inn to Grosvenor Square was long enough to dispel any excitement that his interview had aroused; and long before the well-known house came into view he felt sufficiently braced mentally and physically to seek Eve in the morning-room—­where he instinctively felt she would still be waiting for him.

Thus he encountered and overpassed the obstacle that had so nearly threatened ruin; and, with the singleness of purpose that always distinguished him, he was able, once having passed it, to dismiss it altogether from his mind.  From the moment of his return to Chilcote’s house no misgiving as to his own action, no shadow of doubt, rose to trouble his mind.  His feelings on the matter were quite simple.  He had inordinately desired a certain opportunity; one factor had arisen to debar that opportunity, and he, claiming the right of strength, had set the barrier aside.  In the simplicity of the reasoning lay its power to convince; and were a tonic needed to brace him for his task, he was provided with one in the masterful sense of a difficulty set at nought.  For the man who has fought and conquered one obstacle feels strong to vanquish a score.