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Victor came with the glass of water and remained, with the disengaged air of an inexorable collector.

Forster hesitated for fifteen seconds, and then took a pencil from his pocket and scribbled his name on the dinner check. The waiter bowed and took it away.

“The fact is,” said Forster, with a little embarrassed laugh, “I doubt whether I’m what they call a ‘game sport,’ which means the same as a ‘soldier of Fortune.’ I’ll have to make a confession. I’ve been dining at this hotel two or three times a week for more than a year. I always sign my checks.” And then, with a note of appreciation in his voice: “It was first-rate of you to stay to see me through with it when you knew I had no money, and that you might be scooped in, too.”

“I guess I’ll confess, too,” said Ives, with a grin. “I own the hotel. I don’t run it, of course, but I always keep a suite on the third floor for my use when I happen to stray into town.”

He called a waiter and said: “I s Mr. Gilmore still behind the desk? All right. Tell him that Mr. Ives is here, and ask him to have my rooms made ready and aired.”

“Another venture cut short by the inevitable,” said Forster. “Is there a conundrum without an answer in the next number? But let’s hold to our subject just for a minute or two, if you will. It isn’t often that I meet a man who understands the flaws I pick in existence. I am engaged to be married a month from to-day.”

“I reserve comment,” said Ives.

“Right; I am going to add to the assertion. I am devotedly fond of the lady; but I can’t decide whether to show up at the church or make a sneak for Alaska. It’s the same idea, you know, that we were discussing–it does for a fellow as far as possibilities are concerned. Everybody knows the routine–you get a kiss flavored with Ceylon tea after breakfast; you go to the office; you come back home and dress for dinner–theatre twice a week–bills–moping around most evenings trying to make conversation–a little quarrel occasionally–maybe sometimes a big one, and a separation–or else a settling down into a middle-aged contentment, which is worst of all.”

“I know,” said Ives, nodding wisely.

“It’s the dead certainty of the thing,” went on Forster, “that keeps me in doubt. There’ll nevermore be anything around the corner.”

“Nothing after the ‘Little Church,'” said Ives. “I know.”

“Understand,” said Forster, “that I am in no doubt as to my feelings toward the lady. I may say that I love her truly and deeply. But there is something in the current that runs through my veins that cries out against any form of the calculable. I do not know what I want; but I know that I want it. I’m talking like an idiot, I suppose, but I’m sure of what I mean.”

“I understand you,” said Ives, with a slow smile. “Well, I think I will be going up to my rooms now. If you would dine with me here one evening soon, Mr. Forster, I’d be glad.”

“Thursday?” suggested Forster.

“At seven, if it’s convenient,” answered Ives.

“Seven goes,” assented Forster.

At halft-past eight Ives got into a cab and was driven to a number in one of the correct West Seventies. His card admitted him to the reception room of an old-fashioned house into which the spirits of Fortune, Chance and Adventure had never dared to enter. On the walls were the Whistler etchings, the steel engravings by Oh-what’s- his-name?, the still-life paintings of the grapes and garden truck with the watermelon seeds spilled on the table as natural as life, and the Greuze head. It was a household. There was even brass andirons. On a table was an album, half-morocco, with oxidized- silver protections on the corners of the lids. A clock on the mantel ticked loudly, with a warning click at five minutes to nine. Ives looked at it curiously, remembering a time-piece in his grandmother’s home that gave such a warning.