me?"

"And if I had met you here a year ago, David, I should not have known
you," she said severely. "A woman resents being made a fool of, nor
can she easily forgive one who exposes the sham in which she has a
part. The fault was mine and Mrs. Bannister's, and back of it there
was something else."

"Something else?" I questioned.

Penelope did not answer. She had turned from me to the parasol and the
sand. I repeated the question.

"Herbert Talcott is married--a year now," she said in a measured tone.
"His wife was a Miss Carmody--the daughter of Dennis Carmody, who owns
the Sagamore--or something like that--mine." A pause. Her head
tossed. "He recovered very quickly."

"But the something else?" I insisted.

"There are some things which you will never understand," she answered
carelessly.

"There are some things which you must understand," I cried. "The
hardest task that ever I had was to go to your uncle as I did, like a
bearer of idle gossip. It would have been easier to let you go on as
you were going, ignorant and blind. I knew that it meant an end of our
friendship. That day when I spoke I believed that I was going out of
your life forever. I was not surprised when, on the Avenue, you looked
at me as though I were beneath your notice." I rose and stood before
her. "Had I to do it over again, I would, a thousand times, for your
sake. And didn't I prove that it was for your sake, when I banished
myself and gave up all claim to you?"

"Claim to me?" Penelope's lips curled defiantly. "I should have
thought that you would have been occupied making good your claim to
Miss Dodd, or Bodd, or whatever her name was. I suppose you did right,
but none the less it was unpleasant. I thank you. You see I forgive
you, or we should not be here now talking." She raised her parasol as
though about to rise. "We must go. My uncle is waiting for me, and if
you care to, you may come with me and see him before we start for Rome."

She did not rise; but the matter-of-fact tone in which she made the
threat chilled me, and for a moment I stood silent, looking down at the
black figure. The brim of her hat hid her face from me, but she was
making circles in the sand. I asked myself if this was the time for me
to speak of that claim, to speak my whole heart to her.

She looked up. "David," she said, "you need not stand there so long.
It might be bad for your wound."

"My wound?" I asked, and I took my ol