Maurice, you were very fond of me once."

"Once," said Maurice.

"Not so very many years ago."

"Hang it!" said he, shifting his arm from beneath her hand, "don't let
us have all that stuff over again. It was before you took to drinking
and swearing, and going raving mad with passion, any way."

"Well, dear," said she, with her great glittering eyes belying the soft
tones of her voice, "I suffered for it, didn't I? Didn't you turn me out
into the streets? Didn't you lash me with your whip like a dog? Didn't
you put me in gaol for it, eh? It's hard to struggle against you,
Maurice."

The compliment to his obstinacy seemed to please him--perhaps the crafty
woman intended that it should--and he smiled.

"Well, there; let old times be old times, Sarah. You haven't done badly,
after all," and he looked round the well-furnished room. "What do you
want?"

"There was a transport came in this morning."

"Well?"

"You know who was on board her, Maurice!"

Maurice brought one hand into the palm of the other with a rough laugh.

"Oh, that's it, is it! 'Gad, what a flat I was not to think of it
before! You want to see him, I suppose?" She came close to him, and, in
her earnestness, took his hand. "I want to save his life!"

"Oh, that be hanged, you know! Save his life! It can't be done."

"You can do it, Maurice."

"I save John Rex's life?" cried Frere. "Why, you must be mad!"

"He is the only creature that loves me, Maurice--the only man who cares
for me. He has done no harm. He only wanted to be free--was it not
natural? You can save him if you like. I only ask for his life. What
does it matter to you? A miserable prisoner--his death would be of no
use. Let him live, Maurice."

Maurice laughed. "What have I to do with it?"

"You are the principal witness against him. If you say that he behaved
well--and he did behave well, you know: many men would have left you to
starve--they won't hang him."

"Oh, won't they! That won't make much difference."

"Ah, Maurice, be merciful!" She bent towards him, and tried to retain
his hand, but he withdrew it.

"You're a nice sort of woman to ask me to help your lover--a man who
left me on that cursed coast to die, for all he cared," he said, with a
galling recollection of his humiliation of five years back. "Save him!
Confound him, not I!"

"Ah, Maurice, you will." She spoke with a suppressed sob in her voice.
"What is it to you? You don't care for me now. You beat me,