as playing a game of checkers,
and that it was her turn to play. "Move!" said an inward monitor. "Move!
move!" But she knew not where or how.

The man's arm tightened around her; his lips touched hers again and
again; and although she was conscious of the fact, it carried no
particular significance. It all seemed a part of the scene that was
going on in which she was a silent actor--of the game in which she was a
player.

"Florence," said an insistent voice, "Florence, Florence Baker! Don't
sit like that! For God's sake, speak to me, answer me!"

This time the figure stirred, the head drooped in assent.

"Yes," she said.

Again the circling arm tightened, and the man's lips touched her own,
again and again. The very repetition aroused her.

"And you will sail with me in ten days?"

Fully awake was Florence Baker now, fully conscious of all that had
happened and was happening.

"Yes," she said. "The sooner the better. I want to have it over with." A
moment longer she sat still as death; then suddenly the mood of apathy
departed, and in infinite weakness, infinite pathos, the dark head
buried itself on the man's shoulder. "Promise me," she pleaded brokenly,
"that you will be kind to me! Promise me that you always will be kind!"

CHAPTER XXVI

LOVE'S SURRENDER

Scotty Baker was not an adept at concealing his emotions, and he stared
in unqualified surprise at the long figure in brown which of a sudden
intruded into his range of vision. The morning paper upon his knees
fluttered unnoticed to the floor of the porch.

"Ben Blair, by all that's good and proper!" he exclaimed to the man who,
without a look to either side, turned up the short walk. "Where in
heaven's name did you come from? I supposed you'd gone home a week ago."

Blair stopped at the steps, and deliberately wiped the perspiration from
his face.

"You were misinformed about my going," he explained. "I changed hotels,
that was all."

Scotty stared harder than before.

"But why?" he groped. "I inquired of the clerk, and he said you had gone
by an afternoon train. I don't see--"

Ben mounted the steps and took a chair opposite the Englishman.

"If you will excuse me," he said, "I would rather not go into details.
The fact's enough--I am still here. Besides--pardon me--I did not call
to be questioned, but to question. You remember the last time I saw
you?"

Scotty nodded an affirmative. He had a premonition that the unexpected
was ab