"Take me away from Paris!" sobbed Muriel. "I have come to hate the place. I can't stand it another day. I can't stand it. Some other time, perhaps——Only now—oh, take me away!"
"We'll go home, Muriel," he said. "We'll sail by the first boat. Back to our own country. Back home."
But at that she shuddered.
"That would be worse," she said, rapidly. "It would be worse even than Paris. Don't you see? We left there happy, expecting——Not there. No, I couldn't bear that."
Stainton had put her on a chair and was kneeling beside her, stroking her hair and wrists. His fingers touched the dried blood on her hand, brown and horrible. But he kissed the blood.
She drew the hand from him.
"Your poor little hand!" said Jim. "Let me see the cut."
"It is—there is nothing to be seen. It was only a scratch. Let's talk about getting away."
"I thought," said Stainton, "that you wanted to come back here when we were in Italy."
"I did," she faltered. "It seemed there that it would be easier to tell you here, where it happened. But to-night scared me."