sank on a chair trembling and studiously avoiding the other man's gaze.

At last Reginald rose to go. It seemed impossible to accuse this
splendid impersonation of vigorous manhood of cunning and underhand
methods, of plagiarisms and of theft. As he stood there he resembled
more than anything a beautiful tiger-cat, a wonderful thing of strength
and will-power, indomitable and insatiate. Yet who could tell whether
this strength was not, after all, parasitic. If Ethel's suspicions were
justified, then, indeed, more had been taken from him than he could ever
realise. For in that case it was his life-blood that circled in those
veins and the fire of his intellect that set those lips aflame!




XXVII


Reginald Clarke had hardly left the room when Ernest hastily rose from
his seat. While it was likely that he would remain in undisturbed
possession of the apartment the whole morning, the stake at hand was too
great to permit of delay.

Palpitating and a little uncertain, he entered the studio where,
scarcely a year ago, Reginald Clarke had bidden him welcome. Nothing had
changed there since then; only in Ernest's mind the room had assumed an
aspect of evil. The Antinous was there and the Faun and the Christ-head.
But their juxtaposition to-day partook of the nature of the blasphemous.
The statues of Shakespeare and Balzac seemed to frown from their
pedestals as his fingers were running through Reginald's papers. He