“I had just time to see that it was Madge before she pushed me inside—into the inner room—and slammed the door behind me. It locked with a spring.”
“She was outside?”
“Yes, in my room. I was inside that.”
“I understand.”
“Precisely. I fancy I don’t need to tell you much more. I was a prisoner in my own yacht, and that yacht headed full speed down the bay, my men acting upon what they thought were my own orders. A lovely girl was in my room. I was as much separated from her as if I were in the moon, but my own crew couldn’t know that, and neither could the world.”
“She’s a heroine.”
“She is—the most adorable in the world! She talked to me through the closed door. What she said—well, that’s only for her and me. I saw at last what a mad fool I’d been. Then—then she threw herself on my mercy.”
“You seem to have played the man.”
“She’d make a man of a snake! I saw myself in my true light at last; and I understood her at last. God bless her!”
“Amen!”