All through the night Rodney rode and thought. He was angry at Natalie,

but he was angrier at himself. He felt that he had been brutal,

unnecessarily callous. After all, her only son was on his way to war.

It was on the cards that he might not come back. And he had let his

uneasiness dominate his sympathy. He had lost her, but then he had never

had her. He never could have her.

Half way to town, on a back road, the car broke down, and after vainly

endeavoring to start it the chauffeur set off on foot to secure help.

Rodney slept, uncomfortably, and wakened with the movement of the

machine to find it broad day. That was awkward, for Natalie's car was

conspicuous, marked too with her initials. He asked to be set down at a

suburban railway station, and was dismayed to find it crowded with early

commuters, who stared at the big car with interest. On the platform,

eyeing him with unfriendly eyes, was Nolan. Rodney made a movement

toward him. The situation was intolerable, absurd. But Nolan turned his

back and proceeded to read his newspaper.

Perhaps not in years had Rodney Page faced the truth about himself so

clearly as he did that morning, riding into the city on the train which

carried, somewhere ahead, that quietly contemptuous figure that was

Denis Nolan. Faced the truth, saw himself for what he was, and loathed

the thing he saw. For a little time, too, it was given him to see

Natalie for what she was, for what she would always be, her sole

contribution to life the web of her selfishness, carefully woven,

floating apparently aimlessly, and yet snaring and holding relentlessly

whatever it touched. Killing freedom. He saw Clayton and Graham and

himself, feeders for her monstrous complacency and vanity, and he made a

definite determination to free himself.

"I'm through," he reflected savagely. "I'll show them something, too.

I'll--"

He hesitated. How lovely she was! And she cared for him. She was small

and selfish and unspeakably vain, but she cared for him.

The war had done something for Rodney Page. He no longer dreamed the

old dream, of turning her ice to fire. But he dreamed, for a moment,

something finer. He saw Natalie his, and growing big and fine through

love. He saw himself and Natalie, like cards in the game of life,

re-dealt. A new combination; a winning hand--




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