-ninth of February last
year. I don't think that I have ever sworn so wickedly in my life
before. I had to go to Melbourne pretty soon, I tell you, and make
confession of it to the kind Pater there. And then . . ."

He paused abruptly. The laughter died upon his lips and the look of
gaiety out of his eyes, for Elsa sat more huddled up in herself than
before. He could no longer see her face, for that was hidden in her
hands, he only saw her bowed shoulders, and that they were shaking as if
the girl had yielded at last to a paroxysm of weeping.

"Elsa!" he said quietly, as a puzzled frown appeared between his brows,
"Elsa! . . . you don't say anything . . . you . . . you . . ."

He passed his rough hand across his forehead, on which rose heavy beads
of perspiration. For the first time in the midst of his joy and of his
happiness a hideous doubt had begun to assail him.

A hideous, horrible, poison-giving doubt!

"Elsa!" he pleaded, and his voice grew more intense, as if behind it
there was an undercurrent of broken sobs, "Elsa, what is the matter? You
are not going to turn your back on me, are you? Look at me, Elsa! look
at me! You wouldn't do it, would you . . . you wouldn't do it? . . . The
Lord forgive me, but I love you, Elsa . . . I love you fit to kill."

He was babbling like a child, and now he fell on his knees beside that
low stool on which she sat hunched up, a miserable bundle of suffering
womanhood. He hid his face in her petticoats--those beautiful, starched
petticoats that were not to be crumpled--and all at once his manliness
broke down in the face of this awful, awful doubt, and he sobbed as if
his heart would break.

"Andor! Andor!" she cried, overwhelmed with pity for him, pity for
herself, with the misery and the hopelessness of it all. "Andor, I beg
of you, pull yourself together. Someone might come . . . they must not
see you like this."

She put her hand upon his head and passed her cool, white fingers
through his hair. The gentle, motherly gesture soothed him: her words
brought him back to his senses. Gradually his sobs were stilled; he made
a great effort to become quite calm, and with a handkerchief wiped the
tears and perspiration from his face.

Then he rose and went back to the table, and sat down on the corner of
it as he always liked to do. The workings of his face showed the effort
which he made to keep his excitement and those awful fears in check.

"You are quite right, Elsa," h