t but to go and look for him."

"Who will go?" she asked quietly.

"I."

He was looking at her with grave eyes trained to darkness. But she
looked past him towards the sky, which was faintly lighted by the
aurora. Her averted eyes and rigid attitude were not without some
suggestion of guilt.

"My ship is ice-bound at Reval," said D'Arragon, in a matter-of-fact
way. "They have no use for me until the winter is over, and they have
given me three months' leave."

"To go to England?" she asked.

"To go anywhere I like," he said, with a short laugh. "So I am going to
look for Charles, and Barlasch will come with me."

"At a price," put in that soldier, in a shrewd undertone. "At a price."

"A small one," corrected Louis, turning to look at him with the close
attention of one exploring a new country.

"Bah! You give what you can. One does not go back across the Niemen for
pleasure. We bargained, and we came to terms. I got as much as I could."

Louis laughed, as if this were the blunt truth.

"If I had more, I would give you more. It is the money I placed in a
Dantzig bank for my cousin. I must take it out again, that is all."

The last words were addressed to Desiree, as if he had acted in
assurance of her approval.

"But I have more," she said; "a little--not very much. We must not think
of money. We must do everything to find him--to give him help, if he
needs it."

"Yes," answered Louis, as if she had asked him a question. "We must do
everything; but I have no more money."

"And I have none with me. I have nothing that I can sell."

She withdrew her fur mitten and held out her hand, as if to show that
she had no rings, except the plain gold one on her third finger.

"You have the ikon I brought you from Moscow," said Barlasch gruffly.
"Sell that."

"No," answered Desiree; "I will not sell that."

Barlasch laughed cynically.

"There you have a woman," he said, turning to Louis. "First she will not
have a thing, then she will not part with it."

"Well," said Desiree, with some spirit, "a woman may know her own mind."

"Some do," admitted Barlasch carelessly; "the happy ones. And since you
will not sell your ikon, I must go for what Monsieur le capitaine offers
me.

"Five hundred francs," said Louis. "A thousand francs, if we succeed in
bringing my cousin safely back to Dantzig."

"It is agreed," said Barlasch, and Desiree looked from one to the other
with an odd smile of amusement. For women d