up so that they stood face to face. Again
that strange and beautiful calmness filled her eyes.

"Our trails have strangely crossed, Lady Joanne," he said. "They have been
crossing--for years. While Sir Daniel was at Murja, on the eve of his great
discovery, I was at St. Louis on the Senegal coast. I slept in that little
Cape Verde hotel, in the low whitewashed room overlooking the sea. The
proprietor told me that Sir Daniel had occupied it before me, and I found a
broken fountain pen in the drawer of that sickly black teakwood desk, with
the carved serpent's head. And I was at Gampola at another time, headed for
the interior of Ceylon, when I learned that I was travelling again one of
Sir Daniel's trails. And you were with him!"

"Always," said Joanne.

For a few tense moments they had looked steadily into each other's eyes.
Swiftly, strangely, the world was bridging itself for them. Their minds
swept back swiftly as the fire in a thunder-sky. They were no longer
strangers. They were no longer friends of a day. The grip of Aldous' hands
tightened. A hundred things sprang to his lips. Before he could speak, he
saw a sudden, startled change leap into Joanne's face. She had turned her
face a little, so that she was looking toward the window. A frightened cry
broke from her lips. Aldous whirled about. There was nothing there. He
looked at Joanne again. She was white and trembling. Her hands were
clutched at her breast. Her eyes, big and dark and staring, were still
fixed on the window.

"That man!" she panted. "His face was there--against the glass--like a
devil's!"

"Quade?"

"Yes."

She caught at his arm as he sprang toward the door.

"Stop!" she cried. "You mustn't go out----"

For a moment he turned at the door. He was as she had seen him in Quade's
place, terribly cool, a strange, quiet smile on his lips. His eyes were
gray, smiling steel.

"Close the door after me and lock it until I return," he said. "You are the
first woman guest I ever had, Ladygray. I cannot allow you to be insulted!"

As he went out she saw him slip something from his pocket. She caught the
glitter of it in the lamp-glow.

CHAPTER VII

It was in the blood of John Aldous to kill Quade. He ran with the quickness
of a hare around the end of the cabin, past the window, and then stopped to
listen, his automatic in his hand, his eye piercing the gloom for some
moving shadow. He had not counted on an instant's hesitation. He woul