"No, no,—go!" she cried, drawing her hands up to her face as if to shut out the sight of him from her gaze.
A moment later Challoner was seated in the motorcar. As the chauffeur threw in the clutch some instinct told Challoner to look back. He had a fleeting impression that he had seen a woman's face in the doorway. "Surely that's Miriam," he thought, and lifted his hat; but when he looked again there was no one there. Yet if his senses had been perfectly normal, he would have known that it was her face that he had seen. But the fates had no intention of letting him know that with his departure his wife's resolution had gone, and that she had come to the door to beseech him to come back; for even then they were cunningly spinning the web which was to encompass him about.
II
Cradlebaugh's,—Cradlebaugh's house of a thousand chances,—rearing its four stories of brown stone, spreading itself out liberally on the north side of one of the side streets which is fast being given over to fashionable clubs and restaurants, is a thoroughly up-to-date establishment. Here, the jeunesse dore of the city are made welcome—once the critical eye of the sentinel behind the triple steel doors at the top of the brown stone steps has recognised in them the essential qualifications. In appointments, the house is luxurious and gorgeous, and is so closely shuttered that not a ray of light from outside is permitted to penetrate it: Cradlebaugh's day and night, night and day, is lit within by the glow of artificial lights; the sunlight has no chance in Cradlebaugh's. In addition to the main hall of play, there are accommodations for parties wishing to indulge in quiet games among themselves. Meals are served at all hours,—supper being the specialty of the house,—and notwithstanding that no charge whatever is made for them, the cuisine and service are beyond reproach. It can truly be said of Cradlebaugh's, that it has all the cheerfulness of the hearth, the quiet of the sanctuary, mingled with the glare of irresistible recklessness.
It was to this establishment, then, that Challoner directed a cabby to take him after hours of unsuccessful attempts to borrow money from his friends—unsuccessful, because they had come to know his irresponsibility, and to realise that his obligations were not the obligations of his wife. The consequence was that man after man invented an excuse or refused him emphatically. And finally, in desperation, he had offered to sell the Mastodon. But the dealers knew who owned the car—one of the handsomest cars in town—and on Challoner disgustedly ordering his chauffeur home, a dealer more daring than the others had said to him with aggressive familiarity:—
"Get your wife's bill of sale, Challoner we'll buy it then, all right."
A spark of anger immediately lit up Challoner's eyes, resentment was deep down in his inmost soul; but his brain had been absinthiated for days, his sensibilities blunted, and indignities fell from him like the proverbial water from a duck's back. Nor was it solely with his mentalities that the dissipations of the last five years had played havoc: his face, his body, were unnaturally thin, and his glance had become fixed and strained. Nevertheless, over-indulgence had not grossened him, he was still good-looking, and there was an air about him that few men had. In all his recklessness, whenever he wanted money he had not forgotten that fact. It had always counted with Miriam—until now. It counted still with Miss Letty Love of the Frivolity!
There had been moments, it is true, when rushing madly about town for funds, that he had felt it would surely have been better for him if he had never gone to Cradlebaugh's; but then like a flash would come the thought that if he had not gone to Cradlebaugh's he would never have known Letty Love! And by no means had he arrived at the state where he could have wished that ...
With the thought of Letty Love there came another indissolubly connected with it: Was Colonel Hargraves slowly undermining, ousting him out of her affections? Not without reason he argued that Colonel Hargraves had plenty of money, and the man with money was going to win out in the graces of the Frivolity actress! Challoner could see it, could feel it, and now in this crisis he could not raise a paltry thousand or two ...