The Cords of Vanity

Then I caught the afternoon train for Fairhaven, and went back to my capable fiancée.

But I walked over to Willoughby Hall that night and found Charteris alone in his queer library, among the serried queer books and the portraits of his "literary creditors. " When I came into the apartment he was mending a broken teacup, for he peculiarly delighted in such infinitesimal task-work; but the vexed countenance at once took on the fond young look my coming would invariably provoke, and he shoved aside the fragments.