the cushion beside us, and he was
silent and overjoyed, and tranquilly happy--seeing perhaps, that a
quiet home would in the event be his, and that he was going to live
happy ever after. And after I drew Helena's head closer to my face, I
kissed her hair.

"Do you love me, Helena?" I asked. "Only the truth now, in God's
name!"

"You know I do," she said, and I felt her arms about my neck.

"Have you, always?"

"I think so, yes. It seems always."

"We have been cruel to each other."

"Yes, are cruel now."

"How now?"

"You make me say I love you, and yet----"

"You will marry me--right away, soon, Helena--as I am, poor, ragged,
without a cent, only myself?"

"Not here," she smiled.

"At Edouard Manning's, at once, as soon as we get in?"

"It is duress! I am in the power of a ruffian band! Is it fair? Are
you sure I know my mind?"

"I am sure only that I know my own! Tell me, what was in that note I
carried, addressed to yon varlet Davidson?"

"Sealed orders!"

"And how does that affect me, Helena. Tell me--I know you love me, and
you know that all the rest is small, to that; but as to that wedding
part of it, Helena--what do you say?"

She hesitated for an instant. "You want me to--come--to come with
honor, as you do?"

"Yes. I'll take any risk that means with you."

"Will you take sealed orders, too?"

"Yes."

"Turn on the lights."

I reached the switch, and an instant later a dozen high candle-power
bulbs flooded the suite with light. With a little cry of dismay Helena
sprang away, and stood at my shaving-glass, arranging her hair. Now
and then she turned her face just enough to smile at me a little, her
eyes dark, languid, heavy lidded, a faint shadow of blue beneath. And
now and then her breast heaved, as though it were a sea late troubled
by a storm gone by.

"What will auntie say?" she sighed at last.

"What will you say?" I replied.

"Oh, brute, you shall not know! I must have some manner of revenge
against a ruffian who has taken advantage of me while I was in his
power!"

"Ah, heartless jade!"

"--So you shall wait until we are ashore. I will give you sealed
orders----"

"When?"

"Now. And you shall open them at your friend's house--as soon as we
are all settled and straightened after leaving the boat--as soon
as----"

"It looks as though it were as soon as you please, not when I please."

"Harry, it is my revenge for the indignities you have heaped on me. Do
you thi