It was no picture of a girl that Stephen saw then! It was the girl herself! She was not the wife of Cornelius Morrison. She was his, to love and to win! And again Stephen had the queer sensation of waking up from a bad dream. Again his father’s suicide, the black days that had followed, Milhampton, the boarding-house, the little red cottage and Stella, were all parts of a nightmare. Helen alone was real. She was made for him. She was meant for him. All that had happened to prevent nature’s plan was a mistake, an abortion.

At the time of Helen’s betrayal of her real feelings for Stephen, he made no comment. He seemed not to notice the sharp intaking of her breath, the faint color, the closed lids. He began talking quickly about a certain exchange of property they had been discussing. And he left her very soon. Stephen made up his mind he would not speak a word of love to this beautiful woman until he was free to do so, with no fear of casting reflection upon her reputation.

Divorce, public acknowledgment of a failure in the most sacred department in a man’s or woman’s life, had always seemed hideous to Stephen. But wasn’t it the failure, after all, that was hideous, rather than the acknowledgment? His and Stella’s failure had already been demonstrated. They had already made the slow embittering descent from confidence and hope to doubt and despair. For years their marriage had been absolved. To place the law’s decree upon dead hopes is not the saddest part of the experience. It is not the required death notice in the city’s records that remains graven forever in the memory of the watcher by the bedside. Thus Stephen reasoned.

4

IT WAS IN September, shortly before Laurel’s first visit at Mrs. Morrison’s, that Stephen called on his friend Morley Smith and started proceedings for a divorce. It was in January when Stephen came to the definite conclusion that there was only one way that he could obtain a divorce; and that one way would defeat the object for it.

Stella was as firm as adamant. Every form of argument that Morley Smith could think of, every variety of persuasion that he could devise, had been brought to bear upon her, but to no avail. Stella would not comply. “If Stephen wants a divorce he will have to fight for it,” was her invariable answer.