"I have not."

"It—it is Ricossia?"

She threw back her head and laughed.

"Exactly—it is Ricossia. And, by the way, Mr. Amherst, although I know that when one does an unconventional thing, 'gentlemen' are quite justified in insulting one; yet, as there is a policeman on the next corner, and as even a homeless cur isn't obliged to stand still while some one throws a rock at it—will you leave me?"

"No. Lynn, forgive me. I'm crazy; I don't know what I'm saying. If it were anyone else—if it were any other man—anyone, anyone but that villainous little blackguard"——

"Stop!"

Lynn turned on him like a tigress, her eyes blazing with fury.

"How dare you call him that?" she cried. "A genius! a god of beauty! and dying at that! What sort of man do you call yourself to insult first the woman who was to have been your wife and then a dying man."

Amherst gasped and caught his breath in painful amazement.

"Oh, my God!" he groaned like a hurt animal, "how you must love him, Lynn!"