epart.

Draconmeyer shook his head.

"I think not," he replied. "The doctors have advised me that the climate
of England is bad for my wife's health, and I feel that my own work
there is finished. I have received an offer to go out to South America
for a time. Very likely I shall accept."

He passed on with a final bow. Violet looked across their table and her
eyes shone.

"It seems like a fairy tale, Henry," she whispered. "You don't know what
a load on my mind that money has been, and how I was growing to detest
Mr. Draconmeyer."

He smiled.

"I was rather hating the beast myself," he admitted. "Tell me, what are
your plans, really?"

"I hadn't made any," she confessed, "except to get away as quickly as I
could."

He leaned a little across the table.

"Elopements are rather in the fashion," he said. "What do you think?
Couldn't we have a little dinner at Ciro's and catch the last train to
Nice; have a look at Richard and his wife and then go on to Cannes, and
make our way back to England later?"

She looked at him and his face grew younger. There was something in her
eyes which reminded him of the days which for so many weary months he
had been striving to forget.

"Henry," she murmured, "I have been very foolish. If you can trust me
once more, I think I can promise that I'll never be half so idiotic
again."

He rose to his feet blithely.

"It has been my fault just as much," he declared, "and the fault of
circumstances. I couldn't tell you the whole truth, but there has been a
villainous conspiracy going on here. Draconmeyer, Selingman, and the
Grand Duke were all in it and I have been working like a slave. Now it's
all over, finished this morning on Richard's yacht. We've done what we
could. I'm a free lance now and we'll spend the holidays together."

She gave him her fingers across the table and he held them firmly in
his. Then she, too, rose and they passed out together. There was a
wonderful change in Hunterleys. He seemed to have grown years younger.

"Come," he exclaimed, "they call this the City of Pleasure, but these
are the first happy moments I have spent in it. We'll gamble in
five-franc pieces for an hour or so. Then we'll go back to the hotel and
have our trunks sent down to the station, dine at Ciro's and wire
Richard. Where are you going to stake your money?"

"I think I shall begin with number twenty-nine," she laughed.

* * * * *

They lunched