“Pride,” said she excitedly, as soon as he entered the room for breakfast, “do you know what happened last night? The milkman brought the news this morning. Mrs. Murmuring’s hotel was burned to the ground. I understand nothing was saved at all. It seems that the new man, Sharp, whom she made her manager when Bitterness gave up his share in the business in order to follow the Shepherd—it seems this man must have been drinking in his own room on the ground floor, and somehow started the fire in that room. By the time the people upstairs were wakened, the whole ground floor was in flames and they had to escape from the windows, and when the fire engines arrived the fire was completely out of control and the whole premises ablaze. They were fortunate to escape with their lives. Everything else is gone—everything! They say that Murmuring herself was badly burned about the face and arms while trying to rescue the children, and several other people were injured too. What a loss it will be! I sure hope the premises were insured!”

Her husband, who had been staring at her with a strange, stricken look on his face, now muttered: “I happen to know the place is not insured. That means Murmuring has lost everything. That man Sharp had persuaded her to use all her savings to enlarge and repair the place and to make those big alterations. The business was prospering so well that Murmuring decided this was the time to do it, and she told me that she would not insure it until all the expensive improvements were finished. What’s happened to the man Sharp?”

“Nobody knows. He has completely disappeared. Whether he was burned and lies under the ruins, or whether he escaped, can’t yet be known for sure, but they think it likely he escaped, for the safe in his room was open—and of course empty. Murmuring used to let him deposit the money there each evening and she banked it the following day. It really is extraordinary the way she trusted that man, considering what a shrewd woman she was in every other way. What about Bitterness’s share of the money, Pride? I suppose she couldn’t use her husband’s savings for those extensions and alterations?”

“I understand that he gave up all claim to the money made in the business,” answered her husband in a low voice. “He said he wouldn’t touch a penny of it; that it was money made by destroying men. So I imagine Murmuring had it all.”

“It’s complete ruin for them,” said Superiority commiseratingly, but with the easy superficial concern felt by those who have an assured fortune and cannot be faced by loss or ruin themselves.