LITMIR.BIZ

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really love another woman. At this period, unknowingly, he resisted his mother's influence. He did not tell her things; there was a distance between them.

      Clara was happy, almost sure of him. She felt she had at last got him for herself; and then again came the uncertainty. He told her jestingly of the affair with her husband. Her colour came up, her grey eyes flashed.

      “That's him to a 'T',” she cried—“like a navvy! He's not fit for mixing with decent folk.”

      “Yet you married him,” he said.

      It made her furious that he reminded her.

      “I did!” she cried. “But how was I to know?”

      “I think he might have been rather nice,” he said.

      “You think I made him what he is!” she exclaimed.

      “Oh no! he made himself. But there's something about him—”

      Clara looked at her lover closely. There was something in him she hated, a sort of detached criticism of herself, a coldness which made her woman's soul harden against him.

      “And what are you going to do?” she asked.

      “How?”

      “About Baxter.”

      “There's nothing to do, is there?” he replied.

      “You can fight him if you have to, I suppose?” she said.

      “No; I haven't the least sense of the 'fist'. It's funny. With most men there's the instinct to clench the fist and hit. It's not so with me. I should want a knife or a pistol or something to fight with.”

      “Then you'd better carry something,” she said.

      “Nay,” he laughed; “I'm not daggeroso.”

      “But he'll do something to you. You don't know him.”

      “All right,” he said, “we'll see.”

      “And you'll let him?”

      “Perhaps, if I can't help it.”

      “And if he kills you?” she said.

      “I should be sorry, for his sake and mine.”

      Clara was silent for a moment.

      “You DO make me angry!” she exclaimed.

      “That's nothing afresh,” he laughed.

      “But why are you so silly? You don't know him.”

      “And don't want.”

      “Yes, but you're not going to let a man do as he likes with you?”

      “What must I do?” he replied, laughing.

      “I should carry a revolver,” she said. “I'm sure he's dangerous.”

      “I might blow my fingers off,” he said.

      “No; but won't you?” she pleaded.

      “No.”

      “Not anything?”

      “No.”

      “And you'll leave him to—?”

      “Yes.”

      “You are a fool!”

      “Fact!”

      She set her teeth with anger.

      “I could SHAKE you!” she cried, trembling with passion.

      “Why?”

      “Let a man like HIM do as he likes with you.”

      “You can go back to him if he triumphs,” he said.

      “Do you want me to hate you?” she asked.

      “Well, I only tell you,” he said.

      “And YOU say you LOVE me!” she exclaimed, low and indignant.

      “Ought I to slay him to please you?” he said. “But if I did, see what a hold he'd have over me.”

      “Do you think I'm a fool!” she exclaimed.

      “Not at all. But you don't understand me, my dear.”

      There was a pause between them.

      “But you ought NOT to expose yourself,” she pleaded.

      He shrugged his shoulders.

      “'The man in righteousness arrayed,

       The pure and blameless liver,

       Needs not the keen Toledo blade,

       Nor venom-freighted quiver,'”

      he quoted.

      She looked at him searchingly.

      “I wish I could understand you,” she said.

      “There's simply nothing to understand,” he laughed.

      She bowed her head, brooding.

      He did not see Dawes for several days; then one morning as he ran upstairs from the Spiral room he almost collided with the burly metal-worker.

      “What the—!” cried the smith.

      “Sorry!” said Paul, and passed on.

      “SORRY!” sneered Dawes.

      Paul whistled lightly, “Put Me among the Girls”.

      “I'll stop your whistle, my jockey!” he said.

      The other took no notice.

      “You're goin' to answer for that job of the other night.”

      Paul went to his desk in his corner, and turned over the leaves of the ledger.

      “Go and tell Fanny I want order 097, quick!” he said to his boy.

      Dawes stood in the doorway, tall and threatening, looking at the top of the young man's head.

      “Six and five's eleven and seven's one-and-six,” Paul added aloud.

      “An' you hear, do you!” said Dawes.

      “FIVE AND NINEPENCE!” He wrote a figure. “What's that?” he said.

      “I'm going to show you what it is,” said the smith.

      The other went on adding the figures aloud.

      “Yer crawlin' little—, yer daresn't face me proper!”

      Paul quickly snatched the heavy ruler. Dawes started. The young man ruled some lines in his ledger. The elder man was infuriated.

      “But wait till I light on you, no matter where it is, I'll settle your hash for a bit, yer little swine!”

      “All right,” said Paul.

      At that the smith started heavily from the doorway. Just then a whistle piped shrilly. Paul went to the speaking-tube.

      “Yes!” he said, and he listened. “Er—yes!” He listened, then he laughed. “I'll come down directly. I've got a visitor just now.”

      Dawes knew from his tone that he had been speaking to Clara. He stepped forward.

      “Yer little devil!” he said. “I'll visitor you, inside of two minutes! Think I'm goin' to have YOU whipperty-snappin' round?”

      The other clerks in the warehouse looked up. Paul's office-boy appeared, holding some white article.

      “Fanny says you could have had it last night if you'd let her know,” he said.

      “All right,” answered Paul, looking at the stocking. “Get it off.” Dawes stood frustrated, helpless with rage. Morel turned round.

      “Excuse me a minute,” he said to Dawes, and he would

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