best we can now--but we'll make it."

They drew up at the platform just as the train paused, a grinning porter
waiting on the step with his box.

"Got your bag? Run for it," cried Channing, and followed through the
pelting rain with his own luggage.

The train started even as the chuckling porter helped her on.

"Stateroom fo' N'Yawk,--yessir, yessir! Right in dis way, miss. I done
seed you-all comin'. You suttinly did tek yo' foot in yo' han' an'
trabbel--yessir! yes, _suh_!"

"Lord, what a run!" Channing was saying behind her. "I left the engine
going, too--old Morty will be furious when he finds her! You must be wet
as an otter in spite of that great cape.--Well, little sweetheart, here
we are! Let 's--"

He stopped short. Kate had turned, slipping the cape from her
shoulders.--There they were, indeed. The train sped on, gathering speed
with each mile.

She began to laugh, softly at first, then more and more heartily, till
her whole body shook and the tears streamed down her face. The
romance-loving porter, listening outside, chuckled in sympathy. Channing
essayed a sickly smile.

She stopped as suddenly as she had begun, and a silence fell.

Channing broke it, of course. It was his misfortune in moments of
emergency always to become chatty.

"You have taken me by surprise, really!--I--I didn't recognize you at
first. That cape--Look here, this isn't entirely my fault. You must know
that! I meant to keep my word, I tried to. But Jacqueline would insist
upon seeing me to--to prove that she trusted me. I _told_ her it
wouldn't do. She said she had made no promise.--Oh, hang it all, how
could I help myself, with the girl throwing herself at my head like
that? I'm no anchorite."

"No?" murmured Kate.

"No, certainly not! That is.--Look here, it's not what you think at all!
I've been meeting her at night--it was the only way we could manage. But
I _am_ a gentleman, you know."

"Yes?" murmured Kate.

He tried again, perspiring freely. "This looks bad, I know, but I assure
you--Jacqueline understands that I mean to marry her as soon as things
are definitely settled. She understands me absolutely, the only woman,
perhaps, who ever has. She has temperament herself. Why, that's the
reason I consented to take her away," he continued eagerly, gaining
confidence from the other's silence. "She really ought to have her
training for opera. You don't realize what a voice it is, Mrs. Kildare!
I could offer her certa