. Armed with righteousness, why should not one go
anywhere?"

"Why, indeed?" she murmured.

"But I'm afraid I'm taking you from your play?"

"I'm not going to play any more to-night."

"Tired, already?"

"No; but--but I haven't a cent. That miserable table has robbed me of
everything. All I have left"--piteously--"are the clothes on my
back."

"Something must have been the matter with your 'system.' But if a
temporary loan--"

Susan was tempted, gazing longingly at the table, with the fever
burning in her.

"No," she said, finally. "I _think_ I would win, but, of course, I
_might_ lose."

"A wise reservation! Never place your fortune on the hazard of the
die."

"But I have! What's the use of making good resolutions now? It's like
closing the barn-door after--"

"Just so!" he agreed. "But it might have been worse."

"How?" In dismay. "Didn't that stony-looking man rake in my last gold
piece? He didn't even look sorry, either. But what is the matter with
your arm?" The land baron's expression became ominous. "You shook
hands with your left hand. Oh, I see; the duel!" Lightly.

"How did you hear about it?" asked Mauville, irritably.

"Oh, in a roundabout way. Murder will out! And Constance--she was so
solicitous about Mr. Saint-Prosper, but rather proud, I believe,
because he"--with a laugh--"came off victorious."

Susan's prattle, although accompanied by innocent glances from her
blue eyes, was sometimes the most irritating thing in the world, and
the land baron, goaded beyond endurance, now threw off his careless
manner and swore in an undertone by "every devil in Satan's
calendar."

"Can you not reserve your soliloquy until you leave me?" observed
Susan, sweetly. "Otherwise--"

"I regret to have shocked your ladyship," he murmured, satirically.

"I forgive you." Raising her guileless eyes. "When I think of the
provocation, I do not blame you--so much!"

"That is more than people do in your case," muttered the land baron
savagely.

Susan's hand trembled. "What do you mean?" she asked, not without
apprehension regarding his answer.

"Oh, that affair with the young officer--the lad who was killed in the
duel, you know--"

Her composure forsook her for the moment and she bit her lip cruelly.

"Don't!" she whispered. "I am not to blame. I never dreamed it would
go so far! Why should people--"

"Why?" he interposed, ironically.

Susan pulled herself together. "Yes, why?" she repeated, defia