You know how ridiculous his behavior was on the boat. He never
let me out of his sight, but swore that he was going to give up
smoking and drinking and lead a new life for my sake. I really
believe he meant it, too."
"Wouldn't it have been better, dear," her father suggested,
timidly, "to have encouraged him?"
She shook her head.
"He was absolutely hopeless," she declared. "You say that I have
no nerves; that is because I do not allow myself to suffer. If I
had gone on living with Wenham, it would have driven me mad. His
habits, his manner of life, everything disgusted me. Until I
came to see so much of him, I never understood what the term
'decadent' really can mean. The very touch of him grew to be
hateful. No woman could live with such a man. By the way, he
signed the draft, I suppose?"
Her father handed her a slip of paper, which she looked at and
locked in her drawer.
"Did he make any trouble about it?" she asked.
The professor shivered.
"He refused to sign it," he said, in a low tone, "swore he would
never sign it. Mathers sent me out for a few minutes, made me go
into another room. When I came back, he gave me the draft. I
heard him calling out."
"Mathers certainly earns his money," she remarked, drily.
He gazed at her with grudging admiration. This was his daughter,
his own flesh and blood. Back through the years, for a moment,
he seemed to see her, a child with hair down her back, sitting on
his knee, listening to his stories, wondering at the little arts
and tricks by which he had wrested their pennies and sixpennies
from a credulous public.
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