at, however, the men were
morose and ugly looking, and I am sure it was hard for them to submit to
such a radical change."

"Talk about missionaries! You are a wonder!"

"I could not have done it as a missionary, Mr. Ridgeway. It was
necessary for me to exert my authority as a goddess."

"And so they are cannibals," he mused, still looking at her spirited
face.

"Just think what might have happened to us," she said.

That night as he lay on his couch he was forced to admit that the
inconsolable grief that had borne down so heavily upon him at first was
almost a part of the past. The pain inspired by the loss of a loved one
was being mysteriously eased. He was finding pleasure in a world that
had been dark and drear a few short months before. He was dimly
conscious of a feeling that the companionship of Tennys Huntingford was
beginning to wreak disaster to a supposedly impregnable constancy.

Tears came to his eyes as he murmured the name of the girl who had
sailed so blithely from New York with his love as her only haven. He
called himself the basest of wretches, the most graceless of lovers. He
sobbed aloud at last in his penitence, and his heart went back to the
night of the wreck. His love went down to the bottom of the sea, craving
a single chance to redeem itself before the one it had wounded and
humiliated. Before he fell asleep his conscience was relieved of part of
its weight and the strong, sweet face of Grace Vernon passed from his
vivid thoughts into vague dreams.

In the next apartment tranquilly slept the disturber, the trespasser in
the fields of memory, the undoer of a long-wrought love. He had tried to
learn the way to her heart, wondering if she cared for him as he had
more than once suspected. In pursuing this hazardous investigation he
had learned nothing, had seen nothing but perfect frankness and
innocence, but had become more deeply interested than he knew until this
night of recapitulation.

One night, two or three after he had thrown off the delirium, he heard
her praying in her room, softly, earnestly. Of that prayer one plea
remained in his memory long after her death: "Oh, God, save the soul of
Grace Vernon. Give to her the fulness of Thy love. If she be still
alive, protect and keep her safe until in Thy goodness she may be
restored to him who mourns for her. Save and bless Hugh Ridgeway."

The days and weeks went by and Hugh grew well and strong. To Tennys he
was not the same Hugh