kan desolation in which she was the central figure, Jaffery
was the one who caused her heart to throb. And in her chaste, proud way
she had loved him ever since that extraordinary moment. And though
Jaffery has never confessed it, I am absolutely certain that, just as
Monsieur Jourdain spoke prose, _sans le savoir_, so, without knowing it,
was Jaffery in love with Liosha when she drove away from Northlands in
Mr. Ras Fendihook's car. Perhaps before. _Quien sabe?_ But he imagined
himself to be in love with a moonbeam. And the moonbeam shot like a
glamorous, enchanted sword between him and Liosha, and kept them apart
until the moment of dazed revelation, when he saw that the moonbeam
was merely a pale, earnest, anxious, suffering little human thing, alien
to his every instinct, a firmament away, in every vital essential, from
the goddess of his idolatry.

[Illustration: There is war going on in the Balkans. Jaffery is there as
war correspondent. Liosha is there, too.]

That is how I explain--and I have puzzled my head into aching over any
other possible explanation--the attitude of Jaffery towards Liosha on
the _Vesta_ voyage. Well, my conjectures are of not much value. I have
done my best to put the facts, as I know them, before you; and if you
are interested in the matter you can go on conjecturing to your heart's
content. "Look here, my friend," said I, as soon as I could attune my
mind to new conditions, "what about your new novel?"

He frowned portentously. "It can go to blazes!" "Aren't you going to
finish it?"

"No."

"But you must. Don't you realise that you're a born novelist?"

"Don't you realise," he growled, "that you're a born fool?"

"I don't," said I.

He walked about the library in his space--occupying way.

"I'm going to tear the damned thing up! I'm never going to write a novel
again. I cut it out altogether. It's the least I can do for her."

"Isn't that rather quixotic?" I asked.

"Suppose it is. What have you to say against it?"

"Nothing," said I.

"Well, keep on saying it," replied Jaffery, with the steel flash in his
eyes.

* * * * *

They were married. Our vicar performed the ceremony. I gave the bride
away. Liosha revealed the feminine kink in her otherwise splendid
character by insisting on the bridal panoply of white satin, veil and
orange blossoms. I confess she looked superb. She looked like a Valkyr.
A leather-visaged war correspondent, named