“Mark my words, she will insist on it—her scruples must vanish, and I expect she will really enjoy the flavor of a fine cigar soon, when her Joe is at the other end of it.”
Joe smiled dismally—he realized that he had business before him that would try his nerves, for as a man he had pride and must now humble himself before the woman he loved! But his mind was made up, and he actually felt already as though a load had been taken from his shoulders—just as the prodigal son, as soon as he decided to return to his father, experienced a new feeling of peace.
They left the house and parted at the elevated station, one going up, the other down town.
As he reached the platform, the detective suddenly felt a cold shiver go over him at sight of a man.
It was Paul Prescott, the artist.
There rushed over Eric the memory of that other half of the mystery, and he groaned—this time his sympathy was with Joe and not his wife.
CHAPTER XI
ALL IS FORGIVEN
Joe Leslie never felt so mean in all his life as when he approached his house up town on this evening.
He knew he had been playing a miserable part in deceiving his wife with regard to his smoking, but subterfuge was something generally foreign to Joe’s nature, and this made it seem all the worse to him.
Still, he did not sneak along in a cringing way. Never had he walked more uprightly—for he could look people in the face now, at least, and was determined to make a clean breast of it.