tighter."

"How's that?"

[Illustration: "I'VE DONE WRONG, BUT I'M WILLING TO PAY THE PENALTY"]

"It's a little difficult to explain." He leaned forward, with one of his
nervous, jerky movements, and fingered the glass containing the three
chrysanthemums, but without taking his eyes from Davenant. So far he was
quite satisfied with himself. "You see, it's this way. I've done
wrong--very wrong. We needn't go into that, because you know it as well
as I. But I'm willing to pay the penalty. That is, I'm _ready_ to pay
the penalty. I've made up my mind to it. I've had to--of course. But if
I accepted your offer, you'd be paying it, not I."

"Well, why shouldn't I? I've paid other people's debts before now--once
or twice--when I didn't want to. Why shouldn't I pay yours, when I
should like the job?"

Davenant attempted, by taking something like a jovial tone, to carry the
thing off lightly.

"There's no reason why you shouldn't do it; there's only a reason why I
shouldn't let you."

"I don't see why you shouldn't let me. It mayn't be just what you'd
like, but it's surely better than--than what you wouldn't like at all."

Taking in the significance of these words, Guion colored, not with the
healthy young flush that came so readily to Davenant's face, but in