f country.
She paced the long corridor, and caught the sound of Dorothea's voice.
She was talking; a deeper tone was heard in reply. Jim Blair had
arrived! In another moment she would meet him face to face. It seemed
to Katrine as if at that sound every pulse in her own body ceased
beating; there came a moment of breathlessness, of almost swooning
inability to think or move, then once again she braced herself, and
opened the door.

Against the light, his back turned towards her, stood a tall, uniformed
figure. Dorothea, flushed and trembling, swept forward and enveloped
her friend in a fervid embrace. "_It is Jim_!" she whispered in low,
intent accents. "Jim Blair. Be kind to him, Katrine, _be kind_!"

She slid out of the retaining arms, a wraith-like embodiment of the
Dorothea who had been, and sped from the room. The door closed behind
her, and Katrine stood, a motionless figure, watching another,
motionless as her own. Had he heard? Did he realise her presence?

He was tall and broad; the lines of his uniform fitted tightly to his
figure. He looked a man of whom a woman might be proud, but he was a
man without a personality; a man whose face was hidden.

Katrine laid her hand on the back of a couch and spoke two trembling
words:

"Captain Blair!"

At the sound of her voice he turned, wheeling towards her with a swift
light movement, so that she might see his face, might look in his eyes--
grey, magnetic eyes, curiously light against the sunburn of his face...

Five minutes later, seated upon the huge bamboo couch, supported by
strong arms which seemed to bound the world, Katrine slowly recovered
collected thought.

"You--are--_Jim_! ... Jim is--You! ... Then what of Captain Bedford?
Where is he? _Is_ there a Captain Bedford? Is he a real living man, or
just a fictitious person invented for--"

"Indeed no! He is real enough, poor fellow, but in Egypt still, laid by
the heel; unable to move. I only--only took his place!"

"I think," announced Katrine slowly, "I am very angry!"

It seemed an incongruous statement to make, considering the position and
appearance of the speaker, but the hearer received it with a gravity
which showed that his own conscience was not altogether at ease.

"Dearest, before you judge, let me speak! Hear what I have to say! I
had no intention of deceiving you. Such an idea never entered my head
until at the last moment a cable arrived to say that Bedford was
in