a pinched, white
face, "for over two hours."

"What do you mean?" he asked suspiciously. "Where were you yesterday for
over two hours?"

"In the _Neptune_."

She gazed at him, past him, with widely open eyes, as if she were
staring, fascinated, at some scene of unutterable horror--and there
crept into Jacques de Wissant's mind a thought so full of shameful dread
that he thrust it violently from him.

"You were in the _Neptune_," he said slowly, "knowing well that it is
absolutely forbidden for any officer to take a friend on board a
submarine without a special permit from the Minister of Marine?"

"It is sometimes done," she said listlessly.

Madame Baudoin had now sat down on a low chair, and she was plucking at
the front of her white serge skirt with a curious mechanical movement of
the fingers.

"Did the submarine actually put out to sea with you on board?"

She nodded her head, and then very deliberately added, "Yes, I have told
you that I was out for two hours. They all knew it--the men and officers
of the flotilla. I was horribly frightened, but--but now I am glad
indeed that I went. Yes, I am indeed glad!"

"Why are you glad?" he asked roughly--and again a hateful suspicion
thrust itself insistently upon him.

"I am glad I went, because it will make what Claire has done to-day
seem natural, a--a simple escapade."

There was a moment of terrible silence between them.

"Then do all the officers and men belonging to the flotilla know that my
wife is out there--in the _Neptune_?" Jacques de Wissant asked in a low,
still voice.

"No," said Madeleine, and there was now a look of shame, as well as of
terror, on her face. "They none of them know--only those who are on
board." She hesitated a moment--"That is why I sent the servants away
this morning. We--I mean Commander Dupre and I--did not think it
necessary that anyone should know."

"Then no one--that is, only a hare-brained young officer and ten men
belonging to the town of Falaise--were to be aware of the fact that my
wife had accompanied her lover on this life-risking expedition? You and
Dupre were indeed tender of her honour--and mine."

"Jacques!" She took her hand off the chair, and faced her brother-in-law
proudly. "What infamous thing is this that you are harbouring in your
mind? My sister is an honest woman, aye, as honest, as high-minded as
was your own mother----"

He stopped her with a violent gesture. "Do not mention Claire and my