But nothing of all this could lighten his load or relieve his pain.

She might be given her freedom for a time, or she might be turned over to one of the reformatories for a term of years--either course meant untold suffering to a woman reared as his wife had been.

These mental tortures of the day had burned their way into his brain, as branding-irons burn into flesh, the agony seaming the lines of his face and deep-hollowing the eyes, forming scars that might take years to efface.
As his fingers gripped the knob of Kitty's outside office, shouts of "Happy New Year" rang out from a group of girls showering each other with snowballs.
"Pray God," he said to himself, "that it be better than the one which is passing," and stepped inside, to find Kitty in the kitchen.
"I have come to talk to you," he said, speaking as a man whose strength is far spent.

"And if you do not mind, I will ask you to go into the sitting-room where we shall not be disturbed.

I have something to say to you.