---" I made a sudden pause, for a strange idea had struck me.

CHAPTER III

What if this man, these men and this woman, were in league with him
whose rivalry I feared, and whom I had intended to supplant on the
morrow. It was a wild surmise, but was it any wilder than to believe I
was held here for a mere whim, a freak, a joke, as this bowing, smiling
man before me would have me believe?

Rising in fresh excitement, I struck my hand on the table. "You want
to keep me from going on the steamer," I cried. "That other wretch who
loves her has paid you--"

But that other wretch could not know that I was meditating any such
unusual scheme, as following him without a full day's warning. I
thought of this even before I had finished my sentence, and did not
need the blank astonishment in the face of the man before me to
convince me that I had given utterance to a foolish accusation. "It
would have been some sort of a motive for your actions," I humbly
added, as I sank back from my hostile attitude; "now you have none."

I thought he bestowed upon me a look of quiet pity, but if so he soon
hid it with his uplifted glass.

"Forget the girl," said he; "I know of a dozen just as pretty."

I was too indignant to answer.

"Women are the bane of life," he now sententiously exclaimed. "They
are ever intruding themselves between a man and his comfort, as for
instance just now between yourself and this good wine."

I caught up the bottle in sheer desperation.

"Don't talk of them," I cried, "and I will try and drink. I almost
wish there was poison in the glass. My death here might bring
punishment upon you."

He shook his head, totally unmoved by my passion.

"We deal punishment, not receive it. It would not worry me in the
least to leave you lying here upon the floor."

I did not believe this, but I did not stop to weigh the question then;
I was too much struck by a word he had used.

"Deal punishment?" I repeated. "Are you punishing me? Is that why I
am here?"

He laughed and held out his glass to mine.

"You enjoy being sarcastic," he observed. "Well, it gives a spice to
conversation, I own. Talk is apt to be dull without it."

For reply I struck the glass from his hand; it fell and shivered, and
he looked for the moment really distressed.

"I had rather you had struck me," he remarked, "for I have an answer
for an injury like that; but for a broken glass----" He sighed and
looked dolefully at t