course of his friend's conduct as he would upon his own, and a ghastly
terror sent a pang to his heart.

Still--Cecil stood silent; there was a strange, set, repressed anguish
on his face that made it chill as stone; there was an unnatural calm
upon him; yet he lifted his head with a gesture haughty for the moment
as any action that his defender could have wished.

"I am not guilty," he said simply.

The Seraph's hands were on his own in a close, eager grasp almost ere
the words were spoken.

"Beauty, Beauty! Never say that to me. Do you think I can ever doubt
you?"

For a moment Cecil's head sank; the dignity with which he had spoken
remained on him, but the scorn of his defiance and his denial faded.

"No; you cannot; you never will."

The words were spoken almost mechanically, like a man in a dream. Ezra
Baroni, standing calmly there with the tranquility that an assured power
alone confers, smiled slightly once more.

"You are not guilty, Mr. Cecil? I shall be charmed if we can find it so.
Your proofs?"

"Proof? I give you my word."

Baroni bowed, with a sneer at once insolent but subdued.

"We men of business, sir, are--perhaps inconveniently for
gentlemen--given to a preference in favor of something more substantial.
Your word, doubtless, is your bond among your acquaintance; it is a pity
for you that your friend's name should have been added to the bond you
placed with us. Business men's pertinacity is a little wearisome, no
doubt, to officers and members of the aristocracy like yourself; but all
the same I must persist--how can you disprove this charge?"

The Seraph turned on him with a fierceness of a bloodhound.

"You dog! If you use that tone again in my presence, I will
double-throng you till you cannot breathe!"

Baroni laughed a little; he felt secure now, and could not resist the
pleasure of braving and of torturing the "aristocrats."

"I don't doubt your will or your strength, my lord; but neither do I
doubt the force of the law to make you account for any brutality of the
prize-ring your lordship may please to exert on me."

The Seraph ground his heel into the carpet.

"We waste words on that wretch," he said abruptly to Cecil. "Prove his
insolence the lie it is, and we will deal with him later on."

"Precisely what I said, my lord," murmured Baroni. "Let Mr. Cecil prove
his innocence."

Into Bertie's eyes came a hunted, driven desperation. He turned them
on Rockingham with a lo