e. Facing them they could see in
the distance the lights of Wales. Next morning would see them in dock.

"I will not keep you very long," he said, drawing his chair quite close
to hers, so that they could not be overheard, "but I insist upon knowing
why for the last twenty-four hours you have done nothing but avoid me? I
have not offended you in any way, have I?"

"No!" she answered, looking steadily away at the lights, "you know that
you have not."

"On the contrary," he continued, "I have done what little I could to
make the voyage more endurable to you. Of course I know the pleasure of
your society more than compensated me for any little services I have
been able to render, but still I have done nothing to deserve this
altered treatment from you, and I am determined to know what it means."

"You are exaggerating trifles," she said coldly. "I have felt nervous
and depressed all day, and I did not care to talk to any one. I have not
avoided you more than anybody else."

"That," he answered, "is not true."

She turned slowly round till he could see her face, still and pale and
cold, almost, it seemed to him, luminously white in the heavy darkness
of the moonless hour.

"You can contradict me if you choose," she said, "but you can scarcely
expect me to sit here and listen to you."

He leaned a little closer, and she suddenly felt her hand clasped in
his.

"Virginia," he said,--"yes, I mean it--Virginia, don't be unkind to me,
our last night. You know very well that it hurts me to have you speak
and look at me so. Besides, we are going to be friends; you promised me
that, you know."

"If I did," she answered, "it was very foolish. Friends means the giving
and taking of confidences, and I have none to give. I am going to do
strange things, and in an odd way, and I have no explanations to offer.
If I had friends, they would think that I had taken leave of my senses,
and they would want me to explain. That is just what I cannot do. That
is why I am sure it would be better if you would let me alone."

"I shall not do that," he answered firmly. "I am not a morbidly curious
person, nor do I want to pry into your affairs, but I cannot help
feeling that you are in some sort of trouble, and that it would be good
for you, in a strange country, to have some one on whose help you could
rely in case of need."

"You mean well, I know," she answered, "but you are asking
impossibilities. If you should happen to come across