"He wants to marry her?" repeated Drene, in a curiously still voice.

"He's mad about her. He's abject. It's no secret among hisfriends. Men like that--and of that age--sometimes arrive at such aterminal--men with Graylock's record occasionally get theirs. She hasgiven him a run, believe me, and he's brought up with a crashagainst a stone wall. He is lying there all doubled up at her feetlike a rabbit with a broken back. There was nothing left for him todo but lie there. He's lying there still, with one of her little feeton his bull neck. All the town knows it."

"He wants to marry her," repeated Drene, as though to himself.