So the playing went on, Nolan and Eveley acting as constant and merry chaperons, and the little grouping grew more and more congenial. Lem realized that a convulsion was going on in his home, and reformed desperately for days at a time, but a secluded corner and a lovely woman invariably set him pleading for forgiveness. Miriam always forgave him promptly and said it did not bother her; and was at first frightened, and then delighted, to know that it truly did not bother her any more.
Then one evening, Eveley had a mad telephone call from Lem, quickly followed by a flying rush to her little Cote.
“See what you’ve done,” he shouted, half-way through the window. “That is what comes of your interference. Miriam was the most contented woman on earth till you began feeding her up on this notion of revenge.”
“You sit down and talk sense, Lem Landis, or get out,” said Eveley. “Contented! She hasn’t known a contented day since she married you. You have had five years of jollying with other women. Now because another man smiles on her, you go into a rage and tear your hair. You make me sick.”
“Look here, Eveley, you got me into this, and you’ve got to get me out. I didn’t care how much they smiled. I thought at first it was a put-up job to make me jealous, and I laughed at it. But it has gone too far.”
“Everything is all right,” said Eveley soothingly. “They are just playing. Nolan and I are with them all the time. There is nothing serious between them.”
“Don’t be a fool,” he said rudely. “You know that men and women can’t play like kids. Miriam wants a divorce.”
Eveley sat down and swallowed hard.
“A divorce,” he raged, champing wildly up and down the small room. “She says there is nothing between them, and she does not love him, but she can’t stand me any more. Why can’t she stand me? She stood me for five years. What’s come over her all of a sudden that she says it makes her sick to kiss me? She won’t even let me hold her hand. She says it is blasphemous. Blasphemy to touch my own wife’s hand! You know what that means, don’t you? She is in love with that—that—”
“You can’t swear here,” Eveley broke in quickly. “I won’t have it. I think you are mistaken, Lem. She doesn’t want a divorce. Not really. She wouldn’t, you know.”