forgive me I can't go on with it. Tell me you forgive me!"

"Forgive you?" protested Jimmie. "I love you!"

When Jimmie went to the office of the lawyer, who also was his best
friend, and told him that Jennie wanted a separation, that young man
kicked the waste-paper basket against the opposite wall.

"I'll not do it," he protested, "and I won't let you do it, either. Why
should you smear your name and roll in the dirt and play dead to please
Jeanne? If Jeanne thinks I'm going to send you to a Raines hotel and
follow you up with detectives to furnish her with a fake divorce, you
can tell her I won't. What are they coming to?" demanded the best
friend. "What do they want? A man gives a woman all his love, all his
thoughts, gives her his name, his home; only asks to work his brains out
for her, only asks to see her happy. And she calls it 'charity,' calls
herself a 'slave'!" The best friend kicked violently at the place where
the waste-basket had been. "_Give_ them the vote, I say," he shouted.
"It's all they're good for!"

The violence of his friend did not impress Jimmie. As he walked up-town
the only part of the interview he carried with him was that there must
be no scandal. Not on his account. If Jeanne wished it, he assured
himself, in spite of the lawyer, he was willing, in the metaphor of that
gentleman, to "roll in the dirt and play dead." "Play dead!" The words
struck him full in the face. Were he dead and out of the way, Jeanne,
without a touch of scandal, could marry the man she loved. Jimmie halted
in his tracks. He believed he saw the only possible exit. He turned
into a side street, and between the silent houses, closed for the
summer, worked out his plan. For long afterward that city block remained