"At least when we're dead we're done!" Lorraine broke out.
"Maybe you are--but I haven't heard of anyone who knows; and you'd best not chance it when it is so easy to do the right thing now."
"And the right thing is?" asked Lorraine sarcastically.
"What is best for you both--if you can't be reconciled, then be divorced."
Lorraine smiled a sickly smile, and made no answer.
"Gratuitous advice is rarely acceptable, I know," Devereux went on, "but it is honest and well meant, and comes from a life-long friend of you both. Now, Lorraine, we will say no more on the subject."--He struck the bell. "Take Mr. Lorraine's order," he said to the waiter.
"I think I've had enough," he replied--"both of liquor and the Club, for this time. I'm going home and think it over. I'm a bit tired and out of sorts. So long!" and went slowly out, got into his car and drove off.
Devereux watched him meditatively until he was gone; then he too shook his head--and sat drumming on the chair-arm with his finger tips.
"What is it?" asked Pendleton, who had approached from the rear. "What do you see, Dev--a pretty girl?"
"Do I look it?" said Devereux, glancing around.
"Now that you favor me with your full countenance, I can't say that you do," the other smiled, swinging a chair around for his feet and sitting down. "You are evidently bunkered or have topped your drive. I beg your pardon for intruding--don't let me interrupt, I pray."
"I wasn't playing mental golf--I was thinking."
"I see," said Pendleton. "A good occupation--continue to think, if it isn't too exhausting."
"I was thinking and wondering," Devereux continued--"why Stephanie Mourraille married Lorraine. What in the devil's name did she see in him anyway!--What _could_ she see in him!"
"Qualities which you and I and the other men are blind to," said Montague dryly. "Woman has the power of endowing the man with whom she imagines she is in love, with every attribute that he should normally possess--and rarely does. We're all deficient, Devereux, at the Bar of Popular Opinion--it is only a matter of degree."
"Well, I should say that Lorraine is the maximum degree--and then some," was the reply.--"And that Stephanie knows it at last--when it is too late. Why didn't you marry her, Pendleton? Everyone thought _you_ were willing--and _she_ ought to have been."