e had known what was to be
done--and what alone was to be done. She had seen how he had taken
command by virtue of his knowledge that at such a moment of confusion,
bewilderment, and danger, the command came to him by right of the
fittest.

The heart of the girl swelled with pride; and she felt a pride even in
herself, because she had so instinctively recognised and appreciated
him. She told herself that she must really be worth something when she
had from the very beginning so thoroughly appreciated him. Of course, a
romantic girl's wild enthusiasm might also have been a romantic girl's
wild mistake. The Dictator had, after all, only shown the qualities of
courage and coolness with which his enemies as well as his friends had
always credited him. The elaborate and craftily got-up attack upon him
would never have been concerted--would never have had occasion to be
concerted--but that his enemies regarded him as a most dangerous and
formidable opponent. Even in her hurried thoughts of the moment Helena
took in all this. But the knowledge made her none the less proud.

'Of course,' she thought, 'they knew what a danger and a terror he was
to them, and now I know it as well as they do; but I knew it all along,
and now they--they themselves--have justified my appreciation of him.'
All the time she had a shrinking, sickening terror in her heart about
further plots and future dangers. Some of Ericson's own words lingered
in her memory--words about the impossibility of finding any real
protection against the attempt of the fanatic assassin who takes his own
life in his hand, and is content to die the moment he has taken the life
of his victim.

This was the all but absorbing thought in Helena's mind just then. _His_
life was in danger; he had escaped this late attempt, and it had been a
serious one, and had deluged a house in blood, and what chance was there
that he might escape another? He would go out to Gloria, and even on the
very voyage he might be assassinated, and she would not be there,
perhaps to protect him--at all events, to be with him--and she did not
know, even know whether he cared about her--whether he would miss
her--whether she counted for anything in his thoughts and his plans and
his life--whether he would remember or whether he would forget her. She
was in a highly strung, and, if the expression may be used, an exalted
frame of mind. She had not slept much. After all the wildness of the
disturbance was