th nodded.

"Yes--I have reasons for not caring to quarrel with Keralio just now."

She looked up quickly.

"Why? What is that man to you? He's your fencing master, I know, but
that's no reason for making a friend of him. I never understood why
you associated with him. He is so different to you."

Her husband smiled. He adored his wife and admired the sex in general,
but, like most men, he had never had much respect for women's judgment.
Women were made to be loved; not to discuss business with. Indulgently
he said:

"My dear, you don't understand. I have important financial relations
with Keralio. I don't care for him myself, but one can't choose one's
business associates. He and I are interested in a silver mine in
Mexico. Thanks to him, I got in on the ground floor. One of these
days the investment will bring me a big return."

His wife shrugged her shoulders. Incredulously she retorted:

"Not if Keralio has anything to do with it. I don't trust him. He has
deceit and evil written all over his face."

Amused at her petulance, Kenneth jumped up impulsively and took his
wife in his arms.

Abandoning herself willingly to his embrace, for a moment her head fell
back on his broad shoulder, and she smiled up at him. From her soft,
yielding form arose that subtle, familiar perfume, the intoxicating,
vague, indefinable aroma of the well groomed woman that never fails to
set a man's blood on fire. Bending low until his mouth touched hers,
he kissed her until her face glowed under the ardor of his amative
caress. But to-day she was not in the mood to respond.

"Don't--don't!" she panted, striving to free herself.

"Admit that you're foolish or I'll do it again," he laughed.

"Perhaps I am. It's selfish of me to make it harder for you to go
away."

The butler reentered the room with the finger bowls, and she quickly
disengaged herself. To hide her confusion, she turned to the servant:

"Did my sister go out, Robert?"

"Yes, m'm," replied the man respectfully. "Miss Ray told me to tell
you in case you asked that she had gone shopping and would be back
soon."

"Where's Miss Dorothy?"

"The fraulein took her to the park, m'm."

"When fraulein comes in, tell her to bring Dorothy upstairs."

"Very well, m'm."

The butler went out and Helen turned to her husband. Anxiously she
said:

"I've been a little worried about Dorothy lately. She's not looking
well. I think she needs the count