ose for a
little friendly conversation," he pronounced. "They were both tall
men--about the same height, I should say--and it would have been
impossible for them to have even stood upright."

"You mentioned the fact, did you not," the lady who called herself Miss
Pinsent observed, "that it was raining heavily at the time? Perhaps they
stayed under the bridge to shelter."

"That's something I never thought of," Mr. Greene admitted, "perhaps for
the reason that they both of them seemed quite indifferent to the rain.
The young man in the dark clothes hadn't even an umbrella. I must admit
that I allowed my thoughts to travel in another direction. Professional
instinct, you see. It was a fairly broad canal, and the water was nearly
up to the towing-path. I'd lay a wager it was twelve or fifteen feet
deep. Supposing those two men had met on that narrow path and quarrelled!
Supposing--"

"Don't!"

Mr. Raymond Greene stopped short. He gazed in amazement at Elizabeth
Dalstan, who had suddenly clutched his hand. There was something in her
face which puzzled as well as startled him. She had been looking at her
opposite neighbour but she turned back towards the narrator of this
thrilling story as the monosyllable broke from her lips.

"Please stop," she begged. "You are too dramatic, Mr. Greene. You really
frighten me."

"Frighten you?" he repeated. "My dear Miss Dalstan!"

"I suppose it is very absurd of me," she went on, smiling appealingly at
him, "but your words were altogether too graphic. I can't bear to think
of what might have taken place underneath that tunnel! You must remember
that I saw it, too. Don't go on. Don't talk about it any more. I am going
upstairs for my cigarette. Are you coming to get my chair for me, Mr.
Greene, or must I rely upon the deck steward?"

Mr. Raymond Greene was a very gallant man, and he did not hesitate for a
moment. He sprang to his feet and escorted the young lady from the
saloon. He glanced back, as he left the table, to nod his adieux to the
little company whom he had taken under his charge. Philip Romilly was
gazing steadfastly out of the porthole.

"Kind of delicate young fellow, that," he remarked. "Nice face, too.
Can't help thinking that I've met or seen some one like him lately."

CHAPTER V

Philip Romilly found himself alone at last with the things which he had
craved--darkness, solitude, the rushing of the salt wind, the sense of
open spaces. On the other, the she