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 of its distastefulness, and that Grover could well understand.

She insisted that he accompany her to the Gare d'Orsay, and they arrived in time to see Hellgren come through the gate, clad in a baggy linen suit, mopping his forehead, eagerly smiling. Olga had made a visible effort and was yielding to his fat, proprietory embrace. His greeting for Grover was as friendly as ever.

They drove home and left the luggage with the concierge, proceeding to a restaurant of the quartier for dinner. Grover accompanied them to the house again, since both insisted, and because he suspected that Olga dreaded being left alone with her lover. Then he regretted having done so, for Olga seemed to have developed some fiendish desire to make him wince by bestowing caresses and attentions on Hellgren, while the latter beamed like a human sun on an acre of conjugal felicity.

Hellgren was tired; consequently to his simple way of reasoning, Grover must be tired, and when the latter rose to take leave, though it was only ten o'clock, his host offered him a bedroom for the night, even begged him to remain. For one of the grotesque features of the situation was that Grover, by his forced concentration on Hellgren's sculptures at the time of his first visit, had aroused a fervent partiality in the sculptor's bosom. In his bitterness Grover reflected that even Olga couldn't have conceived a more exquisite form