answer me straight I'll say no
more."

"M'sieu', I am here to consider conditions, not to--" "Oh, for God's
sake, Joan! Tell me now, have you got anything contraband on board?
There'll be a nasty mess about the thing, for me and all of us, and why
can't we compromise? I tell you honestly we'd have come on, if I hadn't
seen you aboard."

Joan turned her head back with a laugh. "My poor m'sieu'! You have such
bad luck. Contraband? Let me see? Liquors and wines and tobacco are
contraband. Is it not so?" Lafarge nodded.

"Is money--gold--contraband?"

"Money? No; of course not, and you know it. Why won't you be sensible?
You're getting me into a bad hole, and--"

"I want to see how you'll come out. If you come out well--" She paused
quaintly.

"Yes, if I come out well--"

"If you come out very well, and we do not sink you before supper, I may
ask you to come and see me."

"H'm! Is that all? After spoiling my reputation, I'm to be let come and
see you."

"Isn't that enough to start with? What has spoiled your reputation?"

"A man, a boy, and a slip of a girl." He looked meaningly enough at her
now. She laughed. "See," he added; "give me a chance. Let me search the
Ninety-Nine for contraband,--that's all I've got to do with,--and then
I can keep quiet about the rest. If there's no contraband, whatever else
there is, I'll hold my tongue."

"I've told you what there is."

He did not understand. "Will you let me search?" Joan's eyes flashed.
"Once and for all, no, Orvay Lafarge. I am the daughter of a man whom
you and your men would have killed or put in the dock. He's been a
smuggler, and I know it. Who has he robbed? Not the poor, not the needy;
but a rich Government that robs also. Well, in the hour when he ceases
to be a smuggler for ever, armed men come to take him. Why didn't they
do so before? Why so pious all at once? No; I am first the daughter of
my father, and afterwards--"

"And afterwards?"

"What to-morrow may bring forth."

Lafarge became very serious. "I must go back. Mr. Martin is signalling,
and your father is calling. I do not understand, but you're the one
woman in the world for my money, and I'm ready to stand by that and
leave the customs to-morrow if need be."

Joan's eyes blazed, her cheek was afire. "Leave it to-day. Leave it now.
Yes; that's my one condition. If you want me, and you say you do, come
aboard the Ninety-Nine, and for to-day be one of us-to-morrow what you
will."

"