allowed Gomez de Montesma to leave the
yacht, with his portmanteaux, unharmed. He meant to take the first
steamer for the Spanish Main, he told Smithson. He had had quite enough
of Europe.

'I daresay it will end in your marrying her,' he said, at the last
moment. 'If you do, be kind to her.'

His voice faltered, choked by a sob, at those last words. After all, it
is possible for a man without principle, without morality, to begin to
make love to a woman in a mere spirit of adventure, in sheer devilry,
and to be rather hard hit at the last.

Horace Smithson sailed his yacht back to Cowes without loss of time, and
sent his card to Lord Maulevrier on board the _Philomel_. His lordship
replied that he would wait upon Mr. Smithson that afternoon at four
o'clock, and at that hour Maulevrier again boarded the _Cayman_; but
this time very quietly, as an expected guest.

The interview that followed was very painful. Mr. Smithson was willing
that this unhappy episode in the life of his betrothed, this folly into
which she had been beguiled by a man of infinite treachery, a man of
all other men fatal to women, should be forgotten, should be as if it
had never been.

'It was her very innocence which made her a victim to that scoundrel,'
said Smithson, 'her girlish simplicity and Lady Kirkbank's folly. But I
love your sister too well to sacrifice her lightly, Lord Maulevrier; and
if she can forget this midsummer madness, why, so can I.'

'She cannot forget, Mr. Smithson,' answered Maulevrier, gravely. 'She
has done you a great wrong by listening to your false friend's
addresses; but she did you a still greater wrong when she accepted you
as her husband without one spark of love for you. She and you are both
happy in having escaped the degradation, the deep misery of a loveless
union. I am glad--yes, glad even of this shameful escapade with
Montesma--though it has dragged her good name through the gutter,--glad
of the catastrophe that has saved her from such a marriage. You are very
generous in your willingness to forget my sister's folly. Let your
forgetfulness go a step further, and forget that you ever met her.'

'That cannot be, Lord Maulevrier. She has ruined my life.'

'Not at all. An affair of a season,' answered Maulevrier, lightly. 'Next
year I shall hear of you as the accepted husband of some new beauty. A
man of Mr. Smithson's wealth--and good nature--need not languish in
single blessedness.'

With this civil