"If I am troubling you--" began Raut.

Horrocks started again. A new light had suddenly come into
the sultry gloom of his eyes. "Not in the least," he said.

"Have you been telling Mr. Raut of all these contrasts of
flame and shadow you think so splendid?" said the woman, turning
now to her husband for the first time, her confidence creeping back
again, her voice just one half-note too high. "That dreadful
theory of yours that machinery is beautiful, and everything else in
the world ugly. I thought he would not spare you, Mr. Raut. It's
his great theory, his one discovery in art."

"I am slow to make discoveries," said Horrocks grimly, damping
her suddenly. "But what I discover . . . . ." He stopped.

"Well?" she said.

"Nothing;" and suddenly he rose to his feet.

"I promised to show you the works," he said to Raut, and put
his big, clumsy hand on his friend's shoulder. "And you are ready
to go?"

"Quite," said Raut, and stood up also.

There was another pause. Each of them peered through the
indistinctness of the dusk at the other two. Horrocks' hand still
rested on Raut's shoulder. Raut half fancied still that the