Walking slowly home in the cool air, Banneker gave thanks for a drink-proof head.  He had need of it; he wanted to think and think clearly.  How did this shocking revelation about Eyre affect his own hopes of Io?  That she would stand by her husband through his ordeal Banneker never doubted for an instant.  Her pride of fair play would compel her to that.  It came to his mind that this was her other and secret reason for not divorcing Eyre; for maintaining still the outward form of a marriage which had ceased to exist long before.  For a lesser woman, he realized with a thrill, it would have been a reason for divorcing him....  Well, here was a barrier, indeed, against which he was helpless.  Opposed by a loyalty such as Io’s he could only be silent and wait.

In the next few weeks she was very good to him.  Not only did she lunch with him several times, but she came to the Saturday nights of The House With Three Eyes, sometimes with Archie Densmore alone, more often with a group of her own set, after a dinner or a theater party.  Always she made opportunity for a little talk apart with her host; talks which any one might have heard, for they were concerned almost exclusively with the affairs of The Patriot, especially in its relation to the mayoralty campaign now coming to a close.  Yet, impersonal though the discussions might be, Banneker took from them a sense of ever-increasing intimacy and communion, if it were only from a sudden, betraying quiver in her voice, an involuntary, unconscious look from the shadowed eyes.  Whatever of resentment he had cherished for her earlier desertion was now dissipated; he was wholly hers, content, despite all his passionate longing for her, with what she chose to give.  In her own time she would be generous, as she was brave and honorable....

She was warmly interested in the election of Robert Laird to the mayoralty, partly because she knew him personally, partly because the younger element of society had rather “gone in for politics” that year, on the reform side.  Banneker had to admit to her, as the day drew close, that the issue was doubtful.  Though The Patriot’s fervid support had been a great asset to the cause, it was now, for the moment, a liability to the extent that it was being fiercely denounced in the Socialist organ, The Summons, as treasonable to the interests of the working-classes.  The Summons charged hypocrisy, citing the case of the Veridian strike.

“That is McClintick?” asked Io.

“He’s back of it, naturally.  But The Summons has been waiting its chance.  Jealous of our influence in the field it’s trying to cultivate.”

“McClintick is right,” remarked Io thoughtfully.

Banneker laughed.  “Oh, Io!  It’s such a relief to get a clear view and an honest one from some one else.  There’s no one in the office except Russell Edmonds, and he’s away now....  You think McClintick is right?  So do I.”

“But so are you.  You had to do as you did about the story.  If any one is to blame, it is Mr. Marrineal.  Yet how can one blame him?  He had to protect his mother.  It’s a fearfully complicated phenomenon, a newspaper, isn’t it, Ban?”