dercurrent, I mean? You don't
_really_ know--"

"No; it is just in the air; I do not know where the rumours come from,
but my aunt has heard them also. There is a vague impression that we
are losing."

"But you shan't lose!" cried Susie. "You shan't lose; not even if I have
to--to--"

"Not even if you have to--?" prompted the Prince, eagerly, as she
stammered and stopped.

"To play my trump card," she finished, with a little unsteady laugh.
"Don't ask me what it is, but it's a good one!"

* * * * *

Meanwhile, as she walked beside the invalid chair, Nell was making her
confession.

"Lord Vernon," she began, in a low voice, "for a time last night, I
feared that I had utterly ruined your cause."

He glanced up at her quickly.

"In what way?" he asked.

"You remember the note you wrote m--us the first day?"

"Perfectly," he answered, noting the stammer, and understanding it,
with a quick leap of the heart.

"I should, no doubt, have destroyed it at once, but I thought it would
be perfectly safe in my desk."

"And it was stolen? No matter, Miss Rushford. It isn't worth worrying
about. I'm sick of the whole affair, anyway--I shall rather welcome the
catastrophe. You've lost sleep over it," he continued, looking at her
keenly. "It has made you almost ill! I shall never forgive myself!"

"Thank you," she said, softly, her lips trembling, her eyes very bright.
"It is beautiful of you to be so generous. But fortunately the note was
not stolen. I found it afterwards among some note-paper, where it had
somehow found its way."

"And you destroyed it?"

"No," she said, and took it from her bosom. "I thought I would better
restore it to you, so that you yourself could destroy it. Here it is,"
and she held it out to him with fingers not wholly steady.

He took it, his eyes still on her face.

"It has caused us enough trouble," he said, and made as though to tear
it into bits.

But Nell laid her hand upon his arm.

"Without looking at it?" she protested.

"You are right," he agreed, and opened it and glanced at the contents.

His hands were trembling slightly as he folded it again.

"On second thought," he said, and there was a certain thickness in the
words which Nell was too agitated to notice, "I believe that I shall
keep it. It is the only souvenir I have, you know, of our first
meeting."

And he smiled up at her--such a smile as Meiamoun must have bent upon
Cleopatra