ccepting them as her absolute due, as the inadequate
liquidation of the debt that lay between them--yet there was now none of
that aloofness amounting almost to scorn which hitherto had marked her
bearing towards him.

He came again some hours later, in the afternoon, by when his Nubians
were once more at their post. He had no news to bring her beyond the
fact that their sentinel on the heights reported a sail to westward,
beating up towards the island before the very gentle breeze that was
blowing. But the argosy they awaited was not yet in sight, and he
confessed that certain proposals which he had made to Asad for landing
her in France had been rejected. Still she need have no fear, he added
promptly, seeing the sudden alarm that quickened in her eyes. A way
would present itself. He was watching, and would miss no chance.

"And if no chance should offer?" she asked him.

"Why then I will make one," he answered, lightly almost. "I have been
making them all my life, and it would be odd if I should have lost the
trick of it on my life's most important occasion."

This mention of his life led to a question from her.

"How did you contrive the chance that has made you what you are?
I mean," she added quickly, as if fearing that the purport of that
question might be misunderstood, "that has enabled you to become a
corsair captain."

"'Tis a long story that," he said. "I should weary you in the telling of
it."

"No," she replied, and shook her head, her clear eyes solemnly meeting
his clouded glance. "You would not weary me. Chances may be few in which
to learn it."

"And you would learn it?" quoth he, and added, "That you may judge me?"

"Perhaps," she said, and her eyes fell.

With bowed head he paced the length of the small chamber, and back
again. His desire was to do her will in this, which is natural
enough--for if it is true that who knows all must perforce forgive
all, never could it have been truer than in the case of Sir Oliver
Tressilian.

So he told his tale. Pacing there he related it at length, from the days
when he had toiled at an oar on one of the galleys of Spain down to that
hour in which aboard the Spanish vessel taken under Cape Spartel he had
determined upon that voyage to England to present his reckoning to his
brother. He told his story simply and without too great a wealth of
detail, yet he omitted nothing of all that had gone to place him where
he stood. And she, listening, was so pro