“I see.  How extraordinary!  But the club has bought in all that land, hasn’t it?”

“Yes—­but the stench of your treachery remains, my friend.”

“Not treachery, only temptation,” observed Ruthven blandly.  “I’ve talked it all over with Orchil and Mottly—­”

“You—­what!” gasped Neergard.

“Talked about it,” repeated Ruthven, hard face guileless, and raising his eyebrows—­a dreadful caricature of youth in the misleading smoothness of the minutely shaven face; “I told Orchil what you persuaded me to do—­”

“You—­you damned—­”

“Not at all, not at all!” protested Ruthven, languidly settling himself once more among the cushions.  “And by the way,” he added, “there’s a law—­by-law—­something or other, that I understand may interest you”—­he looked up at Neergard, who had sunk back in his chair—­“about unpaid assessments—­”

Neergard now for the first time was looking directly at him.

“Unpaid assessments,” repeated Ruthven.  “It’s a, detail—­a law—­never enforced unless we—­ah—­find it convenient to rid ourselves of a member.  It’s rather useful, you see, in such a case—­a technical pretext, you know. . . .  I forget the exact phrasing; something about’ ceases to retain his membership, and such shares of stock as he may own in the said club shall be appraised and delivered to the treasurer upon receipt of the value’—­or something like that.”

Still Neergard looked at him, hunched up in his chair, chin sunk on his chest.

“Thought it just as well to mention it,” said Ruthven blandly, “as they’ve seen fit to take advantage of the—­ah—­opportunity—­under legal advice.  You’ll hear from the secretary, I fancy—­Mottly, you know. . . . Is there anything more, Neergard?”

Neergard scarcely heard him.  He had listened, mechanically, when told in as many words that he had been read out of the Siowitha Club; he understood that he stood alone, discarded, disgraced, with a certain small coterie of wealthy men implacably hostile to him.  But it was not that which occupied him:  he was face to face with the new element of which he had known nothing—­the subtle, occult resistance to himself and his personality, all that he represented, embodied, stood for, hoped for.

And for the first time he realised that among the ruthless, no ruthlessness was permitted him; among the reckless, circumspection had been required of him; no arrogance, no insolence had been permitted him among the arrogant and insolent; for, when such as he turned threateningly upon one of those belonging to that elemental matrix of which he dared suppose himself an integral part, he found that he was mistaken.  Danger to one from such as he endangered their common caste—­such as it was.  And, silently, subtly, all through that portion of the social fabric, he became slowly sensible of resistance—­resistance everywhere, from every quarter.