laughed Madame Berthe
Louison, as she demurely held up her jeweled watch. "Ten minutes more,
and then, Sir, I shall give you your ordre de route. For, I must go
quietly. I trust to your experience and good judgment. There is nothing
to say here. There will be no letters. My bankers have their orders. You
must simply pay our bill, and depart quietly via Geneva. May I ask if
you wish any more money? Some personal needs?"

Major Hawke shook his head. "You may rely on me to meet you, and
to faithfully obey you," he gravely said. There were unspoken words
trembling on his lips, which he fain would have uttered. "By Heavens!
She is a witch!" he murmured, in a repressed excitement, as he walked
quietly down the hallway to keep his tryst with Casimir Wieniawski. For
Berthe Louison had at once divined the cause of his unrest.

"You think that I should tell you more? Why should I tell you anything?
We are strangers yet, not even friends. You may divine that I trust no
man. I have had my own sad lessons of life-lessons learned in bitterness
and tears. I go out to your burning jungle land, with neither hope to
allure, nor fear to repel. The whole world is the same to me. That I
have a purpose, I admit; and even you may know me better by and bye!
Till then, no professions, no promises, no pledges. I use you for my
own selfish purposes, that is all; and you can frankly study your own
self-interest. We are two clay jars swept along down the Ganges of life.
For a few threads of the dark river's current, we travel on, side by
side! You have frankly taken me at my word! I have taken you at yours!
There is a written order to settle my affairs and remove my luggage.
Of course, should you meet with any accident, telegraph to the Vittorio
Emmanuele, at Brindisi. Money," she said, almost bitterly, "would be
telegraphed; and so, I say"--he listened breathlessly--"au revoir--at
Brindisi!" she concluded, giving him her hand, with a frank smile.

As Alan Hawke descended the stair, he growled. "A woman without a heart,
and--not without a head!" As he calmly answered the manager's polite
inquiry for Madame's health, the "heartless woman" whom he had left was
lying sobbing in the dark room above--crying, in her anguish, "Valerie!
My poor, dead Valerie! I go to your child!"

But, none suspected her departure, when the trimly-clad woman glided out
of the entrance of the Hotel Faucon, at eleven o'clock. The maid was in
waiting on the circular place