Lorelei rose and laid her hand over his lips, saying quietly:

"I'm planning our happiness, don't you understand? and it's a big
stake. You must pocket your pride for a while. Nobody will know.
We've made a botch of things so far, and there is only one way for
us to win out."

"A man who'd let his wife--"

"A man who WOULDN'T let his wife have her way at first is a
brute."

"You shouldn't ask it," he cried, sullenly.

"I don't ask it: I insist upon it. If you refuse we can't go on."

"Surely you don't mean that?" He looked up at her with grave,
troubled eyes.

"I do. I'm entirely in earnest. You haven't strength to go out
among your friends and restrain yourself. No man as far gone as
you could do it."

"I've a simpler way than that," he told her, after a moment's
thought. "There are institutions where they straighten fellows up.
I'll go to one of those."

"No." She rejected this suggestion positively. "They only relieve;
they don't cure. The appetite comes back. This is something you