THE VANISHING POINT

By Coningsby Dawson

Author of “The Kingdom Round the Corner,” “The Garden Without Walls,” etc.

Illustrated By James Montgomery Flagg

New York

MCMXXII

Copyright, 1922, by Cosmopolitan Book Corporation

“When you gaze up a railroad track,” said Varensky, “there's always a point in the infinite distance where, just before they vanish, the parallel rails seem, to join. If a train were ever to reach that point it would mean death.

“Life's like that—a track along which we travel on the parallel rails of possibility and desire. The lure of the idealist is to overtake the illusion, where possibility and desire seem to merge, and the safety of the journey ends.”

[ THE VANISHING POINT ]

[ CHAPTER THE FIRST—THE DISAPPEARANCE OF A PATRIOT ]

[ CHAPTER THE SECOND—THE RETURN OF SANTA GORLOF ]

[ CHAPTER THE THIRD—HE PLUNGES INTO ROMANCE ]

[ CHAPTER THE FOURTH—HE BECOMES PART OF THE GAME ]

[ CHAPTER THE FIFTH—THE GREEN EYES CAST A SPELL ]

[ CHAPTER THE SIXTH—THE ESCAPE ]

[ CHAPTER THE SEVENTH—THE CAPTURE ]

[ CHAPTER THE EIGHTH—THE VANISHING POINT ]

THE VANISHING POINT

CHAPTER THE FIRST—THE DISAPPEARANCE OF A PATRIOT

I

PRINCE ROGOVICH! Prince Rogovich!”

Staring up at the clammy wall of the liner, blanched by searchlights, against which the little tug bumped and jostled, Philip Hindwood could hear the Prince's name being shouted in staterooms, along decks and passageways.

It had been midnight when they had drifted like a gallivanting hotel, all portholes ablaze, into the starlit vagueness of Plymouth Harbor. The Ryndam did not dock there; she only halted long enough to put off the English passengers and to drop the English mail. There had been three passengers to land, of whom Hindwood had been the first; the rest were disembarking at Boulogne or Rotterdam. They had been met just outside the harbor by the tug, and the transshipping of the mail had immediately commenced. The last bag had been tossed over the side; the immigration officials had completed their inspection. Santa Gorlof, the second passenger for England, radiantly smiling above her sables, had come down the gangplank. It was for the third passenger that the liner delayed and the tug still waited.

“Prince Rogovich! Prince Rogovich!”

The cries were becoming more insistent and impatient. They broke on the stillness with the monotony of despair. To judge by the sound, every soul aboard the liner had taken up the search, from the firemen in the stoke-hole to the Marconi men on the top deck. Even the thud of the engines seemed ominous, like the pounding of a heart stifled with foreboding. Across the velvety expanse of water, as though they had a secret they were trying to communicate, shore lights winked and twinkled. They seemed to be signaling the information that, no matter how long the search was maintained, Prince Rogovich would not be found that night.

II

Except for this last disturbing incident, it had been a pleasant voyage—the most pleasant Philip Hindwood could remember. They had left New York in the brilliant clearness of blue September skies. The clear blueness had followed them. The slow-going, matronly Ryndam had steamed on an even keel through seas as tranquil and reflective as the proverbial mill-pond. Her company had been dull, consisting mainly of American drummers and Dutch Colonials returning from Java. But he had no grounds for complaint; he had chosen her for her dullness. He had wanted to lay up a store of rest before plunging into the strenuous excitements which were the purpose of his journey.

He had gone aboard her in an unsociable frame of mind, determined to talk to nobody; the success of his errand depended on his silence. He believed that he was half a year ahead of the times. When his rivals had caught up to where he was at present, he would have made himself a world power and dictator.

But the dullness of the ship's company had exceeded expectations. Because of this he had broken his compact and allowed his privacy to be invaded by two vivid personalities. The first had been Prince Rogovich—the second, Santa Gorlof.

Prince Rogovich had evidently boarded the ship with precisely the same intentions as himself. All his meals had been served in his stateroom; it had not been until the evening of the third day that he had appeared on deck. He was a man of commanding height, lean of hip and contemptuous of eye, with the disquieting, haughty reticence of an inscrutable Pharaoh. There was something alluring and oriental about the man, at once sinister and charming. Behind his silky black beard he hid a face which was deathly white; its pallor was not of ill-health, but of passion. It was easy to believe all the rumors about him, both as regarded his diabolical cleverness and his sensual cruelty. His enemies were legion. Even among his countrymen he could count few friends, although he was reckoned their greatest patriot. In Poland he was suspected as much as he was admired, and was accused of intriguing in order that he might set up a throne for himself. The object of his flying visit to America had been to consult financial magnates on the advisability of floating an international loan in the interests of Poland. There were men the world over and in Russia especially, who would have paid a king's ransom for advance information as to what answer the financiers had returned.

Though Hindwood would not have claimed as much, he and the Prince were two of a kind, equally magnificent in their dreams, equally relentless in their means of realization, and equally insatiable in their instinct for conquest. Their difference lay in the fact that the Polish aristocrat had already attained the goal toward which the self-made American was no more than striving.

Their first meeting had happened in the early hours of the morning. Hindwood, being unable to sleep, had partly dressed and gone on deck. There, in the grayness of the dawn, he had espied a tall figure slowly pacing, accompanied by a snow-white Russian wolfhound. It was the remarkable grace of the man that had first held him, his faculty for stillness, his spectral paleness, his padded tread. But the moment he had approached him, the sense of his grace had been obscured by an atmosphere of menace. So sinister was his beauty that it had required an effort to pass him twice. Secretly Hindwood had observed him. He was like his hound, treacherously languid, insolently fastidious, and bred to the point of emaciation. But his languor was the disguise of a hidden fierceness, which betrayed itself in his red, curved lips and the marble coldness of his stare. It was at the third time of passing, when he had all but gone by him, that he had heard his name spoken.

“Mr. Hindwood.” Then, as he had turned, “You're the famous railroad expert. Am I right? It's fortunate we should have met. I missed you in America. So you, too, are among the sleepless!”

Then and there had started the first of those amazing conversations, which had held Hindwood fascinated for the remainder of the voyage. It had made no difference that in his heart he had almost hated the man—hated his ruthlessness, his subtlety, his polished immorality; the moment he commenced to talk, he surrendered to his spell. Their encounters had taken place for the most part between midnight and sunrise. To be his companion was like eavesdropping on the intimate counsels of all the cabinets of Europe or like reading your daily paper a year before it was published for the rest of mankind. On matters which did not concern him the Prince could be brilliantly confessional; indiscretion was the bait with which he lured his victims to reveal themselves. The secrets which were his own he kept. Never once did he drop a hint that would indicate the success or failure of his recent mission. The single time that, Santa Gorlof had asked him point-blank, his dark eyes had become focusless as opals, and his white face, under its silky covering of beard, unnoticing and sphinx-like. It was then that Hindwood had recognized the resemblance to Pharaoh in his tyrannic immobility and silence.

And Santa Gorlof! There was a woman—mysterious, exotic, well-nigh mythical! Compared with her the Prince was an open book. From the start she had made no attempt to explain herself, had referred neither to her past nor her future, had offered no credentials. She had imposed herself on Hind-wood like a goddess who expected to be worshiped. She had swept him off his feet, beaten aside his caution, and reached his heart before he was aware.

But was it his heart? How often, in the past few days, he had asked himself that question! He didn't want to believe that it was his heart. He was a man who rode alone; his aloneness was the reason for his swiftness. He had been tricked once by a woman. That was when he was a boy; now he was a man nearing forty. She had cheated him so cruelly that, though she had been dead many years, the bitterness still rankled. Behind the beauty of all women his skepticism detected the shallow loveliness of the one false woman who had stolen his idealism, that she might trample on it.

He did not love Santa. He had assured himself a thousand times that he did not love her. She was too dangerous, too incalculable. He had spent long hours of wakeful nights in completing the inventory of her bad points. And yet, while he had been with her, his veins had run fire; while he had been apart from her, all his pleasures had seemed tasteless. Who was she? Whence had she come? Whither was she going? What had been her business on the Ryndam, and what had Prince Rogovich known about her? The Prince had known something—something which had given him power over her. At a glance from him, her caprice had vanished and she had become downcast as a child. He had muttered a few unintelligible words, probably in Polish, and her pride had crumbled.

Hindwood was at a loss to account for these signs of a secret understanding. It had been he who had introduced them. It had been Santa who had confessed to curiosity about the Prince and had begged for the introduction. The moment he had made them acquainted, they had seemed to become delighted with each other's company—so delighted that there had been times when he himself had felt excluded. A half-humorous rivalry for Santa's favors had sprung up between the Prince and himself. This atmosphere of jealousy had been accentuated by the behavior of the wolfhound; Santa's mere approach had been sufficient to rouse him into fury. He had become so dangerous that he had had to be sent below whenever she was present.

And yet, despite her manifest efforts to hold the Prince enchanted, behind his back she had expressed the most vigorous aversion. She had spoken of his reputation for treachery and the whispers that went the rounds of his heartlessness toward women. During the final days of the voyage she had partly atoned for this inconsistency by appealing to Hindwood to protect her against the Prince's far too pressing attention. She had declared herself to be in some kind of danger—though what kind, whether moral or physical, she had left him to conjecture. She had rather flattered him by her appeal; nevertheless, he had been considerably surprised to observe how little interest she had still displayed in protecting herself. During the whole of that last day, while they had been approaching the white line of Cornish coast, she had scarcely devoted to him a glance or a word; every minute she had spent with His Highness, whom she professed to regard with so much terror. She had created the impression of employing every trick at her disposal in a frantic attempt to secure him as her conquest.

If, as many of the passengers had asserted, the presence of Santa Gorlof and the Prince on the same boat had been no accident, then what had been the object of their elaborately planned deception? Were they lovers who had chosen this secret method of traveling in order to avoid a scandal? Or was she one of the many women whom he was reported to have abandoned, who had seized the leisure of an Atlantic voyage as an opportunity for reinstating herself in his affection?

As Hindwood listened in the darkness to the Prince's name being shouted and waited for the tug to cast off, the surmise strengthened into certainty that he had been the dupe of a piece of play-acting, the purpose of which he could not fathom.

III

Philip!”

He had been so absorbed in his thoughts that he had not noticed how she had stolen up behind him. Without removing his arms from the rail, he turned slowly and surveyed her.

An enviable woman! And her age? Perhaps thirty. She was probably a Slav—either Russian or Polish. Her face was smooth as marble, high cheekboned and golden in complexion. Her eyes were almond-shaped, heavy-lidded, and of the palest gray. Her lips were passionate and always a little parted, revealing a line of perfect whiteness like a streak of snow between the curling edges of two rose-petals. But it was her hair that was her glory—abundant as night, blue-black as steel, and polished as metal. She wore it simply, gathered back from her forehead and caught in a loose knot, low against her neck. There was an air of indefinable aristocracy about her; perhaps it was the slightness of her figure and the alert composure of her carriage. And then there was a touch of the exotic, wistfully sad, yet exceedingly mocking. Like so many Slavs, behind the European there lurked a hint of the Asiatic. If her eyes had been darker, she might easily have passed for a Hindoo princess.

Her fascination, quite apart from her beauty, lay in the fact that she was so ravishingly feminine. To be a woman was her proud profession—and in this again she was Asiatic. What hours she must have spent over pampering her body! She was sleek and groomed as a race-horse. Physically she was the last word in feminine perfection. Her string of pearls was worth more than most men earn in a lifetime. Her sables represented the year's income of a millionaire. There was no item of her attire that was not sumptuous and that had not been acquired regardless of expense. To have achieved her luxuriance of beauty must have dissipated a fortune. Whose fortune? Surely, not hers!

His mind was haunted by misgivings as he watched her. He had so nearly allowed himself to care for her. It was only her lightness and willful inconsiderateness that had prevented. But now that he had been prevented, her employment of his Christian name struck him as singularly inappropriate. It made him suspect a trap. It put him in a mood to interpret any tenderness on her part as strategy, as a signal that something was wanted.

While he eyed her in silence, she drew nearer and leaned across the rail. Her shoulder pressed him. He was aware of the tingling sensation of her warmth, like a little hand caressing. He caught her fragrance, secret and somnolent as the magic of hidden rose-gardens in Damascus.

She spoke. Her voice was deep and foreign; it seemed too deep to be pent in so slight a body. It was harsh in many of its tones, as though there had been times when it had been parched with thirst. It conjured visions of caravans creeping across molten deserts. It was hypnotic, barbaric. In listening to it, he lost sight of the exquisite sophistication of her appearance. His imagination reclothed her, loosening her hair, veiling her face, shrouding her in a robe of gold and saffron, slipping sandals on her feet and making her ankles tinkle with many bangles.

“You don't like me any more. Is it not so?” she questioned softly. “My master is offended.”

He shook himself irritably, as though he were flinging off the yoke of her attraction. “I'm not offended. I was thinking.”

“About what?”

“Prince Rogovich.”

“And why should my master be thinking of Prince Rogovich?”

He leaned still further across the rail in an instinctive effort to avoid her. There was seduction in the feigned humility with which she addressed him, as though he were a Pasha and she a slave-girl.

“Because,” he said, “it would be indecent for me to be thinking of anything else. He may be dead. There's no knowing. This time last night I could walk and talk and laugh with him. He was full of plans. He was something real that I could touch. To-night he has vanished.”

“Vanished!” She repeated the word with a sigh which was almost of contentment.

“I was wondering,” he continued, and then halted. “You were wondering?” she prompted.

Drawing himself erect, he faced her. Her bantering tone had roused his indignation. Yet, even in his revulsion, he thrilled to the sweetness of her luring eyes, glinting at him palely through the shadows.

“He was more your friend, much more your friend, than mine,” he reproached her. “There's probably been a tragedy. Yet you don't seem to care. One might even believe you were glad.”

“Not glad. Not exactly.” She spoke smilingly, averting her eyes. “But as for caring—why should I?”

He laughed quietly. “Yes, why should you? Why should you care what happens to any man?”

“But I hated him,” she protested. “He had given me cause to hate him.”

“You had a strange way of showing it. You made yourself most amazingly charming. He could never have guessed—no one could ever have guessed who watched you with him, that you—”

“Ah, no. Only you and I—we knew. It wasn't our business to let everybody guess.”

Suddenly she seemed to divine what was troubling him. Darting out her hand, she seized his wrist in a grip of steel. That such strength lay hidden in so frail a hand was unexpected. Her attitude instantly changed to one of coaxing.

“You're jealous. Don't be jealous. It had to be, and it's ended. In a sense it was for your sake that it had to happen.”

Leisurely he freed himself, bending back her fingers and taking pleasure in demonstrating that his strength was the greater.

“I've no idea what you're talking about,” he said coldly. “Your feelings toward Prince Rogovich are none of my concern. If, by the thing that had to happen, you refer to the shameless way in which you made love to him, I can not conceive any possible set of circumstances that would make it necessary for you to make love for my sake to another man.”

He had turned and was sauntering away from her. She went after him breathlessly, arresting him once more with the secret strength of her slim, gloved hand.

“To make love to him! I didn't mean that.”

What it was that she had meant, she had no time to tell. The siren of the Ryndam burst into an earsplitting blast, impatient, repeated, and agonizing. At the signal gangplanks were withdrawn from the tug and run back into dark holes in the side of the liner. Ropes were cast off and coiled. Engines began to quicken and screws to churn. The narrow channel which had separated the two vessels commenced to widen. On the Ryndam the band struck up. Above its lively clamor the sound of Prince Rogovich's name being shouted could still be heard. As Hindwood stared up at the floating mammoth, scanning the tiers of faces gaping down, even at tills last moment he half expected to see the Prince come rushing out. Instead a sight much stranger met his eyes.

The tug was backing away to get sufficient clearance to turn in the direction of land. She had not quite cleared herself, when signs of frenzied disturbance were noticeable on the promenade deck. The musicians were dropping their instruments and fleeing. Passengers were glancing across their shoulders and scattering in all directions. In the vacant space which their stampede had created, the infuriated head of the Prince's wolfhound reared itself. For a couple of seconds he hung there poised, glaring down; then suddenly he seemed to descry the object he was searching. Steadying himself, he shot straight out into the gulf of blackness. In a white streak, like the finger of conscience pointing, he fell, just missing the deck of the tug, where Hindwood and his companion were standing. He must have struck the side, for as he reached the water he sank.

It was over in less time than it takes to tell, but it had seemed to Hindwood that as the hound had leaped, his burning gaze had been fixed on Santa Gorlof.

IV

She made no sound while the danger lasted, but the moment the hurtling, white body had fallen short, she rushed to the side, peering down into the yeasty scum of churned-up blackness. She was speaking rapidly in a foreign language, laughing softly with malicious triumph and shaking a small, clenched fist at the night. It was thus that a woman at Jezreel must have looked, when she painted her face and tired her hair and leaned out of her palace window, jeering at the charioteer who had been sent to slay her. The passionate eloquence of Santa's gestures thrilled as much as it shocked Hindwood; it made her appearance of lavish modernity seem a disguise. And yet he admired her more than ever; it was her courage he admired. Putting his arm about her roughly, “Enough,” he said. “You're coming inside.”

She darted back her head in defiance like a serpent about to strike. Then recognition of him dawned in her eyes. She ceased to struggle and relaxed against his breast. It was only for a second. Slipping her arm submissively into his, “Very well. If you say so,” she whispered.

Guiding her steps across the slippery deck, he pushed open the door of a little saloon and entered. The atmosphere was blue with wreaths of smoke and heavy with the smell of tobacco. At a table in the center, beneath a swinging lamp, the immigration officers were dealing cards and settling their debts with pennies. They were too absorbed in their petty gambling to notice what was going on about them. In a corner, outside the circle of light, he found a trunk and ordered her to sit down. The meekness with which she complied flattered his sense of her dependence. He might really have been a Pasha and she his slave-girl.

He did not understand her. She cozened and baffled him. People and things which he did not understand were apt to rouse his resentment, especially when they were women. His distrust of the sex was inherent. But as he watched this woman drooping in the shadows, his pity came uppermost. She was so alone, so unprotected. The hour was late—long past midnight. Her storm of emotion had exhausted her. It was absurd that he should have allowed himself to become so jealous. He could never have made her his wife. The chances were, she would not have accepted him; she belonged to a more modish world. And if she had, she would have driven him from his course with her whims and tempests. She would have wrecked his career with her greed for wealthy trappings. He and she were utterly different. They had nothing in common but their physical attraction.

He was seeing things clearly. With each fresh whiff of land, affairs were regrouping themselves in their true perspective. He had been the shuttlecock of a shipboard flirtation. He had magnified infatuation into a grand passion. On many a previous voyage he had been the amused spectator of just such profitless expenditures of sentiment. And here he was, a victim of the same foolishness! The futility of the ending was the adventure's condemnation. Probably she was indulging in similar reflections! Within an hour of stepping ashore they would have lost sight of each other forever. After so much intimacy and misplaced emotion, they would walk out of each other's life without regret. Partly out of curiosity, but more out of courtesy, he seated himself beside her for what he intended should be their last conversation.

“What happens next?”

She clutched her furs more closely about her. “I don't know.”

“But you must know,” he persisted. “What I meant was, where is your destination?”

“London.” Then she added wearily, “You could have discovered by examining my labels.”

Her fatigue made him the more determined to be helpful. “I didn't ask out of impertinence, but because I thought it would be London. Probably there'll be no train to London to-night. If the Prince had been with us, they'd have put on a special, but you and I are the only passengers, and neither of us is sufficiently important. Besides, after this delay, it'll be nearly daylight before we clear the Customs.”

“Then I'll have to sleep in Plymouth.”

“Perhaps you'll be met by friends?”

He had no sooner hazarded the suggestion than an obvious conjecture flashed through his mind. The marvel was that it had not flashed earlier. She might be married. If the conjecture proved correct, it would put the final punishing touch of satire to this wild-goose romance.

Sweeping him with her pale, derisive eyes, “Friends!” she murmured. “You may set your mind at rest. I shall be met by no friends.”

After that there was silence, a silence interrupted at intervals by the exclamations of the players as they thumped down their cards and raked in their pennies.

For relief he reverted to the subject uppermost in both their minds. “I wonder what became of him.”

“I wonder.” Her tone betrayed no interest.

“I've been trying to think back,” he said, “trying to remember when last I saw him.”

“Yes.”

“I believe I last saw him alive just after——”

She spun round, as though jerked on wires. “Alive! Who suggests that he isn't alive?”

“No one. I'm the first. But if he isn't found by to-morrow, the suggestion will be on the lips of all the world.”

“I doubt it.”

“You do?” Hindwood smiled. “Men of the Prince's eminence are not allowed to vanish without a stir. I'm only hoping that you and I are not involved in it. We were the only people with whom he associated on the voyage. We're likely to be detained and certain to be questioned. For all we know the air's full of Marconi messages about us at this moment.”

Her face had gone white. “About us? What had we to do with it?”

“Nothing. But when a tragedy of this sort occurs, we're all liable to be suspected.”

She gazed at him intently. “Then you think there was a tragedy?”

“I feel sure of it. It's my belief that he either fell or was pushed overboard. Somewhere out there in the darkness he's bobbing up and down. It's almost as though I could see him. I couldn't feel more sure if——”

She shuddered and pressed against him. “You're trying to frighten me. I won't be frightened. It's all nonsense what you're saying. Why should any one want to push him over?”

“I'm sorry,” he apologized. “I didn't mean to frighten you. Perhaps we're wasting our breath and already he's been found.”

“No, but why should any one want to push him over?” she urged.

“I can't answer that. But he wasn't liked. One could be fascinated by his personality, but one couldn't like him. Take yourself—weren't you telling me a few minutes ago how intensely you hated him?”

She nodded. “He was the sort of man every woman had the right to hate.” After a pause she faced him, completely mistress of herself. “When did you last see him?”

“I'm not certain.” Hindwood hesitated. “As far as I remember, it was after dinner in the lounge. He was giving some instructions about his baggage. When did you?”

“After dinner in the lounge.” Her eyes met his and flickered. “It must have been shortly after eight, for I spent till ten in my stateroom finishing my packing.”

Before she had made an end, he knew that she had lied. Several times after dinner he had walked past her stateroom, hoping for a last encounter. Her trunks and cases had been piled in the passage, already locked and strapped. He had tried to discover from the stewardess her whereabouts and had been told that since dining she had not returned. He had gone on deck in search of her, hunting everywhere. It must have been shortly after ten that he had come across two shadowy figures in the bows. They were whispering together. They might have been embracing. The man's figure had been too dim for him to identify, but he could have sworn that the woman's was hers.

He had reached this point in his piecing together of evidence, when he noticed that the card-players were pushing back their chairs.

Santa touched his arm gently. “I think we're there.”

The next moment the soft bump of the tug against the piles confirmed the news of their arrival.

V

It began to look as if all hope of rest would have to be abandoned. At the moment of landing the dock had been almost festive. There had been a group of railway officials, mildly beaming and fussily important, who had approached Hindwood as he stepped ashore, with “Prince Rogovich, if we are not mistaken?” There had been another group of newspaper reporters who, having addressed him as “Your Highness,” and having discovered their error, had promptly turned their backs on him.

There had been a Major in uniform, with a monocle in his eye, who had pranced up, tearing off a salute and announcing, “I'm detailed by the Foreign Office, your Excellency.”

When they had learned that the Prince had unaccountably avoided Plymouth, their atmosphere of geniality faded. The special train, which was to have borne him swiftly to London, was promptly canceled. Within ten minutes, muttering with disgust, all the world except two porters had dribbled off into the night.

In the waiting-room where, pending the inspection of the Customs officers, Hindwood and Santa were ordered to remain, their reception was no more enlivening. At first, when they had entered, a lunch-counter had been spread, gleaming with warmth and light. Before mirrors, girl attendants had been self-consciously reviewing their appearance with smiles of brightest expectation. Their expectancy had been quickly dulled by the news of the Prince's non-arrival. They had scarcely spared time to supply the wants of the two travelers before they had started to close up. The ticket clerk had copied the girls' example. As he had pulled down the shutter of his office he had briefly stated, “No train till the eight-thirty in the morning.”

After that they had been left—he and this strange woman—in the drafty gloom of the ill-lighted dockstation. The two porters had huddled down and snored among the baggage; Santa, closing her eyes, had appeared to join them in their slumbers.

At last a solitary Customs officer had arrived. He volunteered no explanation for his delay. He was evidently newly risen, half awake, and in a mood of suppressed irritation. His examination was perfunctory. Having completed his barest duty, he likewise made his exit. It was then, when all their troubles seemed ended, that the porters had informed them that it was necessary for passengers to see their luggage weighed and personally to supervise its being loaded in the van for London.

Hindwood turned to his companion. “You're tired. You'd better be off to bed. I'll see this through for you.”

Half an hour later, when he had complied with all formalities and was free to seek a bed himself, he remembered that he hadn't inquired where she would be staying and that he didn't know the name of a hotel. Wondering where he should sleep and how he could reach her with the receipts for her trunks, he wandered out into the yard of the station. The first grayness of dawn was spreading. A chill was in the air. Behind the sepulchers of muted houses a cock was crowing. He gazed up and down. Near the gate a horse-drawn cab was standing. Its lamp burned dimly, on the point of flickering out. The driver sat hunched on the box; the horse hung dejectedly between the shafts. They both slumbered immovably.

Crossing the yard, he shook the man's arm. “Hi! Wake up. I want you to drive me to a good hotel.” The man came to with a jerk. “A good 'otel! That's wot the lady wanted. You must be the gen'leman I wuz told to wait for.”

Hindwood nodded. “So you've driven the lady already! Then you'd better take me to wherever you took her.”

He had opened the door and was in the act of entering when the horse started forward, making him lose his balance. As he stretched out his hands to steady himself, what was his surprise to discover that the cab was already tenanted!

VI

I beg your pardon.”

There was no reply to his apology. He repeated it in a tone of more elaborate courtesy, “I beg your pardon.”

When he was again greeted with silence, he added: “I thought it was empty. I didn't do it on purpose. I hope you're not hurt.”

In the mildewed square of blackness, rank with the smell of stables, he held his breath, trying to detect whether sleep would account for the taciturnity of the other occupant. He could detect nothing; all lesser sounds were drowned in the rattle of their progress. Groping, he felt a woman's dress. Hollowing his hand to shade the flame, he struck a match. For a brief moment his eyes met hers, opened wide and gazing at him. Instantly she leaned forward, pursing her lips. The flame went out.

“What's the meaning of this?” He had been startled and spoke with sharpness.

“There was only one cab, so I——” She yawned luxuriously. “So I waited. I didn't want to lose you.”

It was his turn to be silent. After a pause, while she gave him a chance to reply, she continued: “You'd have been stranded if I'd taken the only cab. And then I didn't want to lose you. Not that losing me would have meant anything to you—not now. It wouldn't, would it?”

There was no escape. However she chose to accuse him, he would be forced to listen. But it couldn't be far to the hotel. Speaking reasonably, he attempted to appease her. “I've given you no occasion for supposing——”

She laughed softly. “Don't you think so? On the boat you were burning up for me. You were molten—incandescent. Now you're dark and dank—through with me.”

She caught her breath. Though he could not see her, he knew that her small, clenched fists were pressed against her mouth. Again she was speaking.

“Why is it? If you'd only give me a reason! While I've been sitting here alone, I've kept asking myself: 'Why is it? Am I less beautiful, less kind, less good? Does he think that he's discovered something evil about me? What have I done that he should have changed so suddenly?'”

With a cry of pain, she turned. “What have I done? It's just that you should tell me. If you'll take me back, I'll be anything for you. I'll try so hard to be more beautiful.”

“You couldn't be more beautiful.”

It was said without enthusiasm. The suspicion still possessed him that she was play-acting. Last evening she had practiced these same wiles on the man who had vanished. Did she intend that he should vanish, too? It was horrible that he should ask himself such a question, and yet he could not rid his imagination of the snow-white hound, plunging to death and pointing at her like the finger of conscience. The happenings of that night had been sufficiently dramatic, so why this second rehearsal? He was too humble in his self-esteem to believe that his own attractions could account for such a storm of passion.

“Santa, you're exaggerating.” He spoke cautiously. “You never belonged to me. Until now you've given no hint that you wanted to belong to me. On the contrary, you've trifled with me and shown a distinct preference for another man. It's preposterous for you to talk about my taking you back when I never had you. We've been companions for a handful of hours. We've liked being together—at least, I have. But to create such a scene is absurd. Nothing warrants it. In the ordinary course of events, our liking might strengthen into love—there's no telling. But everything'll end right here and now if you force matters. What d'you know about me? About you I know even less. If any one were to ask me, I couldn't tell him whether you were a Pole or a Persian, or whether you were single, divorced, or married. I haven't the least idea of your social standing or why, while appearing so prosperous, you travel without a maid and by yourself. For all I know——”

“A man needs to know nothing about a woman,” she interrupted, “except that he loves her. She might be a thousand things; if he loved her, none of them would count. If she were bad, he would hope to make her good with his own goodness. Men always expect women to do that; why shouldn't a woman expect it of a man? If you loved me—and you did love me—no matter how wicked you thought me, even though you believed I'd killed some one, you wouldn't care. You'd find some splendid motive and persuade yourself that I'd done it for the best.” She broke off. Then she added, “Of course, I haven't.”

“Haven't!”

“Haven't killed somebody.”

It was an extraordinary disclaimer—as though it were always within the bounds of possibility that nice, conventional women might have killed somebody. She had said it as casually as another woman might have said, “I don't powder,” or “I don't smoke.”

He scarcely know whether to be shocked or amused. He was loath to take her seriously. Behind the thinning darkness he was trying to discover her expression, when his calmness was swept away by a new disturbance. She had slipped to her knees in the narrow space. By the dim light that streaked the panes he could just make out her figure, bowed against him. The next moment her tears were falling, and she was kissing his hands.

“You mustn't, Santa.”

He tried to withdraw his hands. She clung to them. Failing in that, he attempted to raise her face. She kept it obstinately averted. The bumping of the cab on the uneven paving jostled her against him; he feared lest inadvertently he might bruise her. The situation was grotesque. It stirred both his pity and his anger. If this were play-acting, then it was laughter and not sobbing that was shaking her. But if her grief were real——

At that thought the shy, lonely tenderness of the man overwhelmed him. Here at last was a fellow-creature who needed his affection. She was so fragile, so capricious, so rapturous!

“Poor Santa! I didn't mean—— Somehow I've hurt you.”

She didn't speak, but she stayed her sobbing.

“Let me see your face.”

He stooped lower. The scent of her hair was in his nostrils. His reluctant arms went about her. Their embrace strengthened.

With a moan she lifted up her face, white and ghostly as the dawn that was all about them. In a frenzy of silent longing their lips met.

VII

With a jerk the cab drew up against the pavement. Tossing the reins on the horse's back, the driver was lumbering down. That Santa might have time to compose herself, Hindwood leaned quickly out, slamming the door behind him.

“Where've you brought us?”

“It's a good 'otel,” the man grumbled, on the defensive, staring at the gray cliff of shrouded windows. “It was a good 'otel you wanted. And then it's h'opposite the London Station where the train starts in the marnin'. It'll give the missis ten minutes extry in bed.”

“The missis!” Hindwood frowned. “If you refer to the lady who's with me, she's not my 'missis.'”

The man became sly. Stretching a fat finger along his nose, he edged nearer and whispered: “Between you and me that's h'alright. Wot wiv drivin' so many gentry from the Contingnong me own morals are almost foreign.”

Hindwood turned from him coldly. “You're on the wrong tack. And now how does one get into this hotel? Will they admit us at such an hour?”

“H'at h'all hours. H'absolutely h'at h'all hours.”

“If that's the case,” he thrust his head inside the cab, “you stay here, Santa. I'll go and find out.”

In a few minutes he was back. “They'll take us. Go inside and wait while I settle with the driver.” When he joined her at the desk, he found it necessary to make the same explanation that he had already made to the cabman. The night-porter had allotted them one room, taking it for granted they were married. He had to be informed that two were required.

“D'you want 'em on the same floor and next to each other?”

“On the roof if you like,” Hindwood answered impatiently, “only let us get to bed. We're, or rather I'm catching the eight-thirty train to London in the morning, and it's nearly daylight now. How about you?” He turned to Santa. “What train are you catching?”

“The same as you.”

“Then we might as well breakfast together?”

She nodded.

Turning again to the night-porter, he said, “Put us both down for a call at seven.”

The man was leading the way upstairs. As they followed, Santa whispered,

“You see, you were mistaken.”

“How?”

“You threatened that we'd be detained and questioned. You frightened me terribly. We weren't.”

“No. We weren't.”

She slipped her arm through his companionably. “I feel so relieved and happy. I don't believe there was a tragedy. The Prince changed his mind at the last moment; he's landing at Boulogne or Rotterdam. It may even have been a strategy to mislead some enemy who was waiting for him here in Plymouth.”

“Perhaps. I never thought of that.”

Their rooms were on different floors. The porter showed the way to hers first. Now that they had to separate, Hindwood would have given much for a private word with her. Discreetly, outside her door, in the presence of the night-porter, they parted.

“Then we meet at breakfast,” he reminded her.

“At breakfast,” she assented. “And let's hope that we don't oversleep ourselves.”

VIII

It seemed to him that his head had just touched the pillow when he was awakened by his door being pounded. Sitting up in bed, he consulted his watch. Seven exactly!

“I'm awake,” he shouted. With that he jumped out of bod to prevent himself from drowsing.

His first thought was of her; again he was going to meet her. The prospect filled him with excitement, but not with gladness. His dreams had been troubled by her; there had been no moment since he had closed his eyes that he had been without her. The wildness of that kiss, bestowed in the dark by a woman humbling herself, had set his blood on fire. It was not right that a man should be kissed like that, and yet he longed to reexperience the sensation.

“Any woman could have done it,” he argued. “This isn't love; it's nothing peculiar to Santa. Any reasonably beautiful woman could have done it by acting the way she acted. I had consoled myself that I was immune from women. I was starving, and I didn't know it.”

His sane mind warned him that it would be wise to avoid further encounters. She was too alluring for him to withstand. There were too many things about her that were unaccountable. There was her frenzied display of infatuation for both himself and the Prince, all within the space of twelve hours.

He was brushing his hair and viewing his reflection in the shabby mirror, when he reached this point. He stopped brushing and regarded his reflection intently. What could any woman discover in those features to go mad over? It was a hard face, cleanshaven, bony, and powerful, roughened by the wind and tanned by the sun. It was the mask of an ascetic, which concealed rather than revealed the emotions. And yet once it had been sensitive; you could trace that in the kindly blueness of the eyes and the faint tenderness of the full-lipped mouth. The hair was a rusty brown, growing thin about the temples; the nose was pinched at the nostrils with long-endured suffering—the brow furrowed. He smiled in amused disapproval and went on with his brushing. Not the face of an Apollo! Nothing to rave about!

And yet, despite his looks, here was at least one woman who, for whatever reason, was desperate to marry him. On the drive through the dawn from the dock to the hotel she had left no doubt of her intentions. It inflamed his curiosity. Though he was nearing forty, with the exception of that one disastrous affair, women were still for him an untried adventure. But in the case of Santa, to indulge his curiosity further might lead to penalties. She was liable to repeat last night's performance; the journey to London would probably provide her with a fitting opportunity. If it did, could he muster the cruelty to refuse her?

On one point his mind was made up: he would not marry her. He had no time to waste on marriage. With her it would be folly. Moreover, while her breaking down of reticences had spurred his eagerness, it had forfeited his respect. It had robbed him of his prerogative of conquest. It had changed him from the hunter into the hunted. He was all but trapped.

“Trapped!”

He was fastening his bag. He pressed the catch into the lock and stood up.

“Trapped! Not yet. Not exactly.”

Immediately his mind began to race, devising plans for eluding capture. He didn't need to keep his breakfast appointment with her. He could miss the eight-thirty and travel to London later. He could slip out unnoticed and take up his abode in another hotel. Once he had lost her, he would have put himself beyond temptation. She would have no clew to his whereabouts, nor he to hers.

As he passed slowly down the stairs, he was still undecided as to how he should act. On arriving in the hall, he loitered by the hotel desk, half determined to call for his reckoning and make a bolt for it. While he dallied, the yearning to see her for a last time swam uppermost. After all, he owed something to the only woman who had paid him the compliment of loving him. He would not speak to her, would not let her know that he was there. He would peep into the room unseen and remember her always as waiting for him.

Bag in hand, he strode along the passage to the coffee-room, where breakfast was being served. The baize doors were a-swing with scurrying waiters. Stooping, he peered through the panes. Pushing the doors slightly open, he gazed more steadily. The room was littered with ungroomed people, their heads bowed, their elbows flapping, like a flock of city sparrows snatching crumbs from beneath the hoofs of passing traffic. Nowhere could he espy her, his rarer bird of the dainty plumage.

He grew ashamed of his furtiveness. Why should he be afraid of her? She shouldn't be disappointed. She should find him gallantly expecting her. Resigning his bag to a solicitous bell-boy, he drew himself up to his lean western height and entered.

IX

Seated at a table, lie had watched the swing-doors for a full half-hour. He had finished his breakfast. If he were to catch the eight-thirty, it was time for him to be moving. He began to flirt with the idea of postponing his journey; it was evident she had overslept herself.

At the desk, while he settled his account, he had it on the tip of his tongue to inquire for her, but he was daunted by the presence of the night-porter. The man kept eyeing him with a knowing grin, as though he were expecting just such a question.

“I won't gratify him,” Hindwood thought. “The fellow knows too much. It's fate, if I miss her.”

He crossed the road to the station. Having secured a seat in a first-class smoker, he roamed up and down the platform. Every few minutes he consulted his watch as the hands circled nearer to the half-hour. He bought papers at the news-stand and returned to buy more papers; from there, while not seeming to do so, he could obtain a clear view of the hotel. And still there was no sign of her.

When it was almost too late, he threw caution to the winds. At a gait between a run and a walk, he recrossed the road and dashed up the hotel steps. As he confronted the clerk behind the desk, he was a little breathless; he was also aware that the night-porter's grin had widened.

“There's a lady staying here. She was to have traveled with me to London. I'm afraid she's not been wakened.”

“A lady!” The clerk looked up with the bored expression of one who was impervious to romance. “A lady! Oh, yes.”

“She's a passenger from the Ryndam,” he continued. “Her name's Miss Gorlof. Send some one to her room to find out at once——”

The night-porter interrupted. Addressing the clerk, he said: “The gentleman means the foreign-looking lady wot I told you about—the one in all the furs.” Then to Hindwood, “She was called for at six this mornin'. A gentleman in goggles, who couldn't speak no English, arrived in a tourin' car and drove off with 'er.”

“Drove off with her. But——”

Realizing that too much emotion would make him appear ridiculous, he steadied his voice and asked casually, “I suppose she left a note for me?”

The clerk glanced across his shoulder at the rack. “Your name's Mr. Hindwood, isn't it?” He raised his hand to a pigeonhole lettered “H”. “You can see for yourself, sir. There's nothing in it.”

“Then perhaps it was a verbal message. She would be certain to leave me her address.”

The clerk turned to the night-porter. “Did she?” The night-porter beamed with satisfaction. “She did not.”

He had achieved his dramatic effect.

X

He was the last passenger to squeeze through the barrier. As he scrambled into his carriage, the train was on the point of moving. Spreading one of his many papers on his knees, he lit a cigarette. He believed he was behaving as though nothing had happened. “That I can take it like this proves that she was nothing to me,” he assured himself.

Ten minutes later he discovered that he had not read a line and that the cigarette had gone out.

“I suppose I'm a bit upset,” he admitted, “though goodness knows why I should be. The matter's ended exactly as I wanted.”

But had it? What had he wanted? Does a man ever know what he wants where a woman is concerned? He desires most the thing which he most dreads. During the voyage he had wanted to win her from Prince Rogovich. On the tug he had wanted to forget her. In the cab he had wanted to go on kissing her forever. That morning he had wanted to save his freedom. On the station, like a maddened schoolboy, his terror had been lest he might lose her.

As a result he had lost her. Somewhere through the sunny lanes of Devon she was speeding with the gentleman who “couldn't speak no English” and wore goggles. In which direction and for what purpose he could not guess.

He smiled bitterly. It was a situation which called for mirth. He had accused her of having trapped him at a time when she herself had been escaping from him. He had complained that her affection was too ardently obvious at a moment when she was proving herself most coldly elusive. While he had been resenting the way in which he was being hunted, she had already abandoned him to hunt to his heart's content.

His reflections were broken in upon by a weakeyed old clergyman seated opposite to him in the far corner.

“Excuse me, but I see by your labels that you've just landed. May I ask whether your vessel was the Ryndam?”

“It was.”

“Then there's an item in the local paper which should interest you. It has to do with Prince Rogovich, the great Polish patriot. He was your fellow passenger, if I'm not mistaken.”

Hindwood was disinclined for conversation. He made his tone brusk that he might discourage further questions. “You're not mistaken, and I guess I know what you're going to tell me: that after all the preparations made for his reception, the Prince didn't land at Plymouth but, without notifying any one, traveled on either to Boulogne or Rotterdam.”

“But that wasn't what I was going to tell you,” the old gentleman continued in his benevolent pulpit manner. “Oh, no, I was going to tell you something quite different. After the Ryndam left Plymouth, the Captain had her searched from stem to stern. Not a trace of the Prince could be found.”

“Extraordinary! I suppose the news was received by wireless. Does the paper suggest an explanation?”

“None whatsoever. I thought you'd be interested. Perhaps you'd like to read for yourself.”

The paper contained the bare fact as the clergyman had stated it. “A complete search was made. All his personal belongings were found intact, but of the Prince himself not a trace.”

Hindwood closed his eyes and pretended to sleep that he might protect himself from further intrusions. He wanted to argue his way through this problem and to acquit Santa of any share in what had happened. And yet, if an investigation were held and he himself had to tell all he knew, things would look black for her. Was that why——?

He tried to crush the ugly thought, but it clamored to be expressed. Was that why she had made love to him—that her kiss might seal his lips with silence?

The train was slowing down. He opened his eyes. In the cheerfulness of sunshine life took on a more normal aspect. Towering above crowded roofs of houses, a tall cathedral pricked the blueness of the sky.

“Where are we?”

The clergyman was collecting his bundles. “Exeter—where I alight.”

As soon as he had the carriage to himself, before any one could enter, he reached up to the rack and quickly removed the Ryndam labels from his bag. Having done that, he stepped to the platform and went in search of papers. The torn labels were still in his hand. Surreptitiously he dropped them between the train and the platform, some distance lower down than his own carriage. He realized the stealth he had employed only when Exeter was left behind.

“Ridiculous!” he shrugged his shoulders. “It's getting on my nerves.”

In his most recently acquired batch of papers he found no reference to the topic which absorbed him. At the time when the London press had been published, the disappearance of the Prince had not been known to the world.

Throughout the journey, at every fresh stopping-place, he repeated the performance, dashing down platforms in quest of newsboys and purchasing copies of every journal on sale. He caught himself continually eyeing his bag to make sure that he really had removed all labels. He began to feel as if he himself were the criminal. In his intentions he was already an accessory after the fact. Whether Santa was innocent or guilty, at all costs he had determined to shield her.

Through the late summer afternoon, as he drew nearer to London, his suspense began to die. He was getting the later editions now; none of them so much as mentioned the affair. In Plymouth and Bristol it had probably been of local importance. He took courage to smile. What a coward dread can make of an honest man!

Afternoon was fading into the gold of evening when they steamed into Paddington. By making haste he could just reach the American Embassy before closing time. It was likely that several communications had been addressed to him there. He had cabled ahead to the Ritz for a reservation. It wouldn't take him far out of his direction to call at the Embassy on the way to his hotel.

In the stir and bustle of familiar London, the nightmare of the voyage grew vague. He stepped from the carriage like a man awaking. It thrilled him with happy surprise to discover the old gray city, plumed with smoke and smiling, waiting unchanged beneath his feet to welcome him. The very smell of mingled gasoline and horses from the cab-ranks was reassuring. Every sight that his eyes encountered made him feel respectable.

“Any luggage, sir?” It was a porter accosting him.

“Yes. Two trunks. At least, I guess they're on this train.”

“Which van, sir?”

“The one from Plymouth.” Then, with conscious bravado, he added: “I'm from the Ryndam. You'll recognize them by the Holland-American tags.”

The porter had gone to secure a barrow. While Hindwood waited, gazing about him idly, his eyes were startled by a news-placard bearing the following legend:

DISAPPEARANCE OF A PRINCE

FOUL PLAY SUSPECTED

He swayed, as though he had been struck by a bullet. He glanced round feverishly, fearing lest he might espy another placard stating, “Santa Gorlof Arrested.” But no—for the moment she was safe. He thanked God for the touring-car and the forethought of the foreign gentleman who could speak no English.

Quickly he began to readjust his plans. If he went to claim his trunks, there was no telling by whom he might be met—newspaper men, detectives, officials from the Foreign Office. Moreover, Santa's trunks were in the van. When he had explained himself, he might be called upon to account for her absence. There was only one thing for him to do: for her sake he must get out of England. If he delayed, he might be prevented. It would be unwise for him to go to the Ritz; he must spend the night at some obscure hotel. The only place to which he might be traced was the Embassy; but he would have to risk that—it was of the utmost importance that he should pick up his communications.

He was on the point of making good his escape, when the porter trundled up with his barrow.

“Hi, mister! Where are you goin'? I'll be needin' you to identify 'em.”

“I know you will.” Hindwood turned on him a face which was flustered. “But I've just remembered I have an engagement. I'll send for them later. It'll make no difference to you; here's what I should have paid you.”

The man, having inspected it carefully, pocketed the half-crown. “It won't take long,” he suggested; “me and the barrow's ready. And it won't cost you nothink, seein' as how you've paid me.”

“No time.”

Without more ado, he made a dash for the nearest taxi. “As fast as you like,” he told the driver; “the faster, the bigger your fare.”

He fled out of the station at a forbidden rate, but after half a mile the taxi halted against the curb. Lowering the window, he looked out.

“What's the matter? Something wrong with your engine?”

“We ain't been follered. You can calm down,” the driver assured him soothingly. “Wot's wrong is that you ain't told me no address.”

“Stupid of me! The American Embassy.”

At the Embassy, having explained his errand, he was requested to wait. Then, rather to his surprise, instead of having his letters handed to him, he was shown into a handsome room where, at the far end, a gray-haired man was seated, sorting papers behind a large mahogany table.

Hindwood crossed the room and held out his hand.

“I'm Philip Hindwood, the railroad expert. I guess you've heard of me. I called in case there was some mail for me. I had no intention of troubling you personally.”

“I'm glad you've come,” said the gray-haired man gravely. “If you hadn't troubled me, I should have had to trouble you. There have been inquiries for you. They have to do with a woman who goes by the name of Santa Gorlof. The police thought you might know something about her. It seems she's wanted.”

CHAPTER THE SECOND—THE RETURN OF SANTA GORLOF

I

SO Santa was “wanted!” Why she was wanted Hindwood did not dare to question. And the police thought he could tell them something! He could, but it would be something to put them off her track. After kissing a woman, it wasn't likely he'd betray her. She might have committed every crime on the calendar; it would make no difference. He had learned his code of honor on the outskirts of civilization, where law is more often defied than obeyed. By his standards of chivalry, after what had passed between them, he had no option but to play the game by her. What did they think he knew? Why should they think he knew anything?

He masked his anxiety with seeming unconcern. Without his assistance, they could make little headway. He must let fall no hint that would suggest a sentimental interest in her fortunes. He would be spied on—probably he had been spied on already. For all he knew, the clergyman in the train, the porter at Paddington, the taxi-driver who had assured him that he wasn't followed, were detectives. Henceforward he must live his life normally and in public, doing everything to disarm suspicion. Any divergence from his usual habits, such as staying in obscure quarters or canceling engagements that he might escape to the Continent, would create the impression that he was possessed of guilty knowledge. If he had to speak of her, he must refer to her as a charming acquaintance and profess horror that such a charge should have been brought against her.

Following this line, he left the Embassy with the promise that he would consult with the police at their earliest convenience. From there he drove to the Ritz, adhering to arrangements made before this sinister thing had happened. To avoid being waylaid, he went straight to his rooms, having ordered his trunks to be fetched from the station and his dinner to be served in his apartment.

The suite allotted him was one which he had occupied on several previous occasions. It soothed his ruffled pride to discover that his preferences had been remembered. From the front windows he could gaze down Piccadilly; from the side he could watch the green park, a lake of jade, imprisoned between walls of granite. In the panes facing westward a fairy city hung poised, tipped with flame and ensanguined by the sunset.

Leisurely he set to work to bathe and shave, stretching out the ritual and reveling in the recovery of his self-respect. Slowly the sunset faded. Before he had made an end, the golden September dusk was drifting down. In the twilight he stretched himself on the bed, waiting for his trunks with his wardrobe to arrive. He felt that he could face the police with much more calmness if he was clad in the respectability of evening dress.

He must have dozed, for the room was completely dark when he was brought to his feet by the sharp ringing of the telephone. As he fumbled for the receiver, he thought, “Well, I've a good reason for not seeing them. Pajamas aren't dignified.”

Aloud he said: “Yes. Quite correct—Mr. Hind-wood. Yes, the Mr. Hindwood who's just landed from the Ryndam. You traced me by my trunks! You were expecting I'd claim them in person! The man from the Ritz is there! That's all right. Thank you for telling me. What was my reason?—Certainly not. I was avoiding no one. What did you say you were?—A newspaper-man!—I guess not. I've nothing to tell—no. That's final.”

He had scarcely hung up when the bell commenced ringing again. The next half-hour was spent in refusing to be interviewed by invisible persons. It seemed as though every journalist in London were waiting in queue to get on to him. Some were suave, some bullying; all were persistent. Didn't he know that he owed it to the public to say something? If a list of questions was submitted to him, would he make a written statement?

To cut the clamor short, he instructed the hotel operator to allow no one to speak with him who would not state his business. For the rest of the evening he was “out” to any one who had to do with the press. After that the telephone grew quiet.

He switched on the lights. As he did so, he noticed that he was trembling with excitement. He was furious. This assault had made him aware of the unseen wall of hostility by which he and Santa were surrounded. She hadn't a chance; the whole of organized society was against her. The odds were brutally unfair. Nothing that she had done could warrant such unsportsmanly cruelty. So far it had not been proved that she had done anything, yet every one was willing to prejudge her. The pursuit was cowardly. Whether he loved her did not matter. It was a problem in knight-errantry: to protect her he was willing to risk all that he was and had.

The arrival of his trunks gave him something else to think about. When he was dressed, he felt ready for every emergency. After all, he was not the criminal.

He had his dinner spread against a window from which he could watch the arc-lights of Piccadilly strung across the night like a rope of pearls. He tried to be persuaded that he was enjoying himself. If the police didn't call on him within the hour, he would saunter out to a music-hall and rub shoulders with the crowd.

But would he? To what purpose? He would have to go alone, as he always went. It would be different if she were with him. The last nine days had spoiled him for loneliness; they had taught him the romance of a woman's friendship. And yet, not friendship—she had asked for his affection. All his life he had craved to give his love to some woman. Until he had met Santa, his craving had been denied. No woman had seemed to care. Because of that, in spite of success, he had reckoned himself a failure. He had attained everything—power, position, wealth—everything except his desire. There had been moments on the voyage when it had seemed to him that his goal was in sight.

If she were to tap on his door, how would he greet her? If she did, it would be like her; she could always be counted on to do the unexpected. He told himself that he would ask her no questions. He would not upbraid her. He would comfort her in the way that she understood best. When the police came to interrogate him, he would place his arm about her and answer:

“Gentlemen, if it is Santa Gorlof you are seeking, she is here. I have asked her to be my wife.” The scene as he conjured it was worthy of Dumas; he was thrilled by the gallantry of his imagination. His ponderings were cut short by a sharp rap. He sprang to his feet; it almost seemed that his dream was to be realized. The rap was repeated. Outside the door a page was standing.

“There's a gentleman downstairs. He won't give his name. He says you left word, sir, at the American Embassy, that you would be willing to see him.”

“Show him up.”

II

Leaving the door ajar, he drew a chair to his desk and commenced rummaging through a pile of documents. He planned to create the impression that he regarded this visit as of small importance. He was anxious, even at the risk of appearing vulgar, to be discovered in the rôle of an American money-lord, every second of whose time represented dollars—the kind of man who was too influential to be bulldozed by the police methods of a country whose citizenship he did not share. He urged himself into a mood of contempt by recalling the beefy caricatures which pass currency in English fiction for veracious portraits of Scotland Yard detectives. This fellow would look like a constable off duty. When he sat down, he would bulge at the neck and mop his forehead with a multicolored handkerchief. He would be awed by elegance into sulky stupidity—but would become pompously affable when offered a cigar.

“May I enter?” The door creaked.

“Surely. Come in. But you must excuse me for a moment.” Hindwood spoke without turning. He pretended to be sorting the last of his documents. The cultured tone of the voice had surprised him. Perhaps, after all, his guest might not be a detective.

“Sorry to keep you. Time's valuable. My stay in England is short. There, that's finished. What can I do for you?” He pushed back his chair and rose to face his guest.

If the man's intonation had surprised him, his appearance amazed him still more. He could have passed for the colonel of a crack cavalry regiment. His bearing was erect and dapper. His dark lounge suit, with the light stripes running through it, was so smartly tailored that one was apt to suspect that he was corseted. His hair was white, his cheeks tanned, his manner cheerful and commanding. He was of less than medium height. With his bristling mustache and pointed imperial he bore a distinct resemblance to Lord Roberts of Kandahar.

Hindwood held out his hand with undisguised relief. “Won't you sit down, sir? I'm afraid I must have seemed discourteous. The truth is, I was expecting some one quite different. The boy didn't announce your name or business.”

The stranger accepted his hand with an ironic smile. He did not sit down. Instead he asked a question. “Wouldn't it be wise to shut the door?” Without waiting for permission, he went to the door and closed it. Before he closed it, he glanced out into the passage. Having regained the middle of the room, he gazed searchingly about him.

“No one here who can listen?”

Again taking matters into his own hands, he made a swift and thorough investigation, peering into the bathroom, stabbing draperies with his cane as with a sword, feeling behind clothes in cupboards. He left no corner uninspected in which an eavesdropper might be secreted. Last of all he approached the window near which Hindwood had dined. For a few seconds he stood there, staring down into the well of blackness and the mysterious fairyland of shifting lights. Laying aside his hat and gloves, but still retaining his cane, he remarked:

“Beautiful! Very beautiful! Exquisite with the witchery of a woman's face, which masks a hidden wickedness!”

Hindwood had been regarding him in silence. “I have yet to learn your name and business,” he reminded him.

The stranger chuckled. “My name! I have almost forgotten it. I assume so many. As for my business, I'm a secret service agent in the employ of the British Government.”

“Have you credentials?”

“A letter.”

He produced from his breast pocket an envelope, containing this message, typed on American Embassy notepaper, “This will serve to introduce the gentleman who is anxious to consult you on the subject of which we spoke this afternoon.”

“Satisfactory?”

“Quite. Perhaps now you'll be seated. If you smoke, I can recommend these cigars.”

Again the stranger, with unruffled urbanity, betrayed his alert independence. “If you have no objection, I prefer my own.”

“As you like.” Hindwood was determined to conduct the interview along the lines of social politeness. Selecting a cigar himself, he notched the end. “I'm entirely at your disposal. There's little I can tell. I suppose the subject on which you're anxious to consult me is what happened on the Ryndam?”

“Yes and no.” The stranger puffed leisurely for a few moments. “The answer is yes, if by 'what happened on the Ryndam you mean Santa Gorlof.”

III

Santa Gorlof?” Hindwood feigned surprise. “A very charming lady!”

The shrewd face puckered in a smile. The gray eyes grew piercing beneath the beetling, white brows. “So I've been given to understand. She has a way with the men, has our Santa. Even Prince Rogovich, old hand that he was, fell for her. I believe that's your expressive phrase in America. He fell for her in every sense, especially when she pushed him overboard.”

Hindwood frowned. He realized that a cat-and-mouse game had commenced, in which he had been allotted the rôle of mouse. He resented the levity with which Santa's name had been mentioned. If the man was in earnest, the matter was too terrible for jest. Though he had harbored the same suspicion, to hear it stated as a fact appalled him. The charge sounded dastardly, spoken in that pleasant voice by this courtly English gentleman who was old enough to be her father.

With an effort he kept command of his composure. “Of course you're joking?”

“Not in the least.”

“Then, in plain American, you're accusing a beautiful and fascinating woman of murder.”

“Of what else?”

Hindwood shrugged his shoulders. “Pardon my density. I didn't catch on. It was your appearance misled me; you look so much a gentleman.”

“I flatter myself that there are occasions when I am.”

“Then I guess we'll have to reckon this occasion an exception. I might remind you that it's a woman you're accusing and that the penalty for murder is death. Scarcely a subject to make merry over with a play upon words!”

“And you're reminding me,” the stranger added gently, “that, if she's a woman, you and I are men. You're trying to tell me that, if my supposition is correct, then all that ravishing caprice that we know as Santa Gorlof will have to be ruthlessly blotted out. Possibly you're picturing, as so many of her victims have pictured before you, the wealth of happiness that might be yours if you could win her for yourself.”

Hindwood's hand trembled as he flicked his ash. “My dear sir,” he drawled, “I'm not twenty. I'm a hard-bitten man of the world. You credit me with too much romance. In your profession you're trained to spin theories. Please leave me out; stick to your assertion. You come to me, accusing a woman of my acquaintance—I can hardly call her a friend—of having committed murder. The charge sounds preposterous. Why you should come to me at all I can not guess. Before we go further, I have a right to ask a question: is this mere conjecture or can you prove it?”

“I can prove it.” The stranger paused, studying the despair his words had caused. “I can prove it.” Then he added, “If you'll help.”

“If I'll perjure myself.” Scowling, Hindwood leaped to his feet. “That was what you meant. At your time of life I should have thought you could have found a less infamous way of gaining your livelihood. There's your hat, and there's the door.” The mocking old gentleman went through the dumb show of clapping his applause. He settled himself more deeply in his chair. When he spoke, it was with the lazy good-humor of a man at his club. “You fill me with admiration. Your last attitude was superb. I have only one criticism to offer of your play-acting; by letting your cigar go out, you betrayed the perturbation you were trying to disguise. It's been dead three minutes.” He raised his hand, delaying interruption. “Don't be angry. I'm not doubting your momentary sincerity. But think back and then own that you also have suspected that she's guilty.”

“Never.”

“Humph! Your memory must be faulty. Allow me to prompt you with a few facts.”

Then and there, without hesitation or boasting, he detailed to Hindwood all his actions, from his departure from the Ryndam to the moment when he had arrived at the Embassy. Hindwood listened to the narration dumfounded.

“So you see,” he concluded, “if I can tell you so much as this, there is probably much more that I could tell. You've been infatuated by a she-wolf. What she did to Prince Rogovich, she has done to at least a dozen of her admirers. She would have done the same to you. Because there have been moments when you thought you loved her, you're unwilling to hand her over to justice. You're even willing to risk your own good name in her defense. It's sports-manly of you, but she's undeserving of your loyalty. When you know the truth, you'll thank your lucky stars that I came to-night.”

IV

Hindwood's face had gone ashen—not through fear for his own safety, but for hers. He was determined not to believe a word of what he had heard, and yet he was curious to learn. There was such an air of complete conviction about the stranger; it was impossible to doubt the integrity of his intentions. What he hoped was to discover some flaw in his logic. Sinking back into his chair, he stared in silence at the man who believed he knew everything.

Remembering that his cigar had gone out, he commenced searching through his pockets for a match.

“They're at your elbow,” the stranger informed him. “No, not there. On the table. I've upset you more than I intended.”

Again they lapsed into silence.

At last Hindwood said: “I owe you an apology. I've been insulting, but the blame is partly yours. You didn't explain yourself; you withheld your identity. I was expecting a kind of policeman. But I think you understand. Anyhow, I regret my rudeness. Now tell me, who are you?”

“I'm Major Cleasby, formerly of the Indian Army. My main hobby is studying the Asiatic.” Hindwood looked up sharply. He remembered the impression Santa had made on him, that if her eyes had been darker, she could have passed for a Hindoo princess.

“I don't see what studying the Asiatic has to do with the disappearance of Prince Rogovich,” he said. “If we're going to arrive anywhere, what we need is frankness. I think you ought to understand my side of the affair.”

The Major nodded.

“Then, to start with, I'm unmarried—not that I'm a woman-hater, but my life has been too packed with important undertakings to leave me much time to spare on women. I've been a kind of express, stopping only at cities and rushing by all the villages. On the Ryndam I was forced to come to rest; it so happened that Santa Gorlof was the village at which I halted. The Ryndam, as you know, isn't one of these floating palaces; she doesn't attract the flashy type of traveler. The company on this last voyage was dull—dull to the point of tears. The Prince and Santa Gorlof were the two exceptions. I got to know her first and the Prince later. It was I who introduced her to him. We were each of us a bit stand-offish at first; we drifted together against our wills, in an attempt to escape from boredom. Then we began to expect each other, till finally—We were two men and a woman, with nothing to distract us; it's an old story—the usual thing happened. I suppose you'd call it a three-cornered flirtation in which the Prince and I were rivals.

“At first Santa was strictly impartial; toward the end it was the Prince she favored. I'm afraid I got huffy, which was distinctly childish, for none of us was serious. We were two men and a beautiful woman at loose ends, rather dangerously amusing ourselves. At Plymouth, if things had terminated normally, we should have come to our senses and gone our separate ways. At most we should have said good-by on reaching London. In none of our dealings had there been the least hint of anything serious—nothing that would suggest a love-affair. Speaking for myself, my interest in Santa had been on the wane for several days before we landed. I should have parted with her on the dock without compunction, if this extraordinary disappearance hadn't occurred. It was that that again drew us together. Neither of us was willing to believe the worst; we both tried to persuade ourselves that he'd changed his plans at the last moment. At the same time we were both a little anxious lest we might be bothered with questions and detained. Probably it was to avoid any such annoyance that she dodged her breakfast engagement with me and escaped so early this morning.”

The Major thrust himself forward, resting his chin on the handle of his cane. “That wasn't her reason.”

“You're presuming her guilt. Why wasn't it?”

“You forget the foreigner who wore goggles and pretended he couldn't speak English. She couldn't possibly have sent him word. The necessity for her escape must have been foreseen and the means prearranged.”

Hindwood puzzled to find some more innocent explanation. “He might have been her husband.”

“He wasn't.”

“You speak as though you knew everything.” Then, with a catch in his breath, “She isn't arrested?”

“If she were, I shouldn't tell you.”

“Then what makes you so positive that he wasn't her husband?”

The Major drew himself erect, smiling palely. “Because I am her husband.”

V

Hindwood rose and moved over to the window. He felt mentally stifled. He leaned out, gazing down into the pool of blackness, along whose floor, like the phosphorescence of fishes, lights drifted and darted. The sight of so much coolness quieted him. When he turned, the Major had not moved a muscle; he was sitting as he had left him, erect and palely smiling.

“You'll not be surprised when I tell you, Major Cleasby, that your last piece of information completely overwhelms me. You come to me in the rôle of a secret service agent, and now you claim to be her husband.”

“I'm both.”

“Do you mean me to understand that you're accumulating the evidence that will convict your wife?”

“Convict her and, I regret to say, hang her. Stated baldly, that is my purpose.”

Hindwood perched himself on the window ledge and regarded his guest intently. He didn't look a monster; he looked in all respects a kindly, well-bred gentleman, and yet, if what he had just heard was correct, there were few monsters in history who could compare with him. Hindwood tried to picture him as Santa's husband. He couldn't. He was thankful that he couldn't. For a reason which he did not distress himself to analyze, he didn't wish to believe that she had ever had a husband. As for the hints about her criminal record and her many lovers, he utterly rejected them. Was it likely that a woman so royal and aloof could have stooped to the gutter? But if these accusations were not true, what was their object? Either it was a case of mistaken identity and there were two Santa Gorlofs, or the object was to infuriate him with jealousy so that he would blurt out all he knew.

He eyed the Major doubtfully. He wasn't insane. He didn't look a rascal. And yet, what husband in his senses——? He began to notice details.

The Major was less old than he had fancied at first; he was more worn than aged. Illness or tragedy might have whitened him. It was even possible that he had made himself up for the part he was playing. His eyes were clear, and his hands virile. With the mustache and imperial removed——

“Major Cleasby, you ask me to accept a great deal on your bare word,” he said politely. “You come to me with nothing to introduce you but the most briefly formal letter. The moment you enter my room, before you'll have anything to do with me, you inspect every hiding-place as though I were a counterfeiter or an anarchist. You boldly announce to me that ever since I landed in England you've had me followed and observed. You use the results of your spying as a kind of blackmail to induce me to present you with the sort of evidence for which you're searching. You trick me into telling you about a shipboard flirtation with a woman whom you say you want convicted of murder. No sooner have I told you, than you declare that you yourself are married to her. I ought to refuse to allow this interview to go further without calling in a lawyer. I don't mean to be offensive, but your kaleidoscopic changes put a strain on my credulity. I can't believe your story that you're a secret service agent endeavoring to get your wife executed. When men tire of matrimony, they find less ingenious methods of recovering their bachelorhood.”

The Major smiled with his patient air of affability. “It isn't my bachelorhood that I'm trying to recover. It's my——”

“If you don't mind,” Hindwood cut in, “I'd like to finish my say first. One of the things that you may not have learned is that I'm here on a mission of international dimensions. It concerns more than one of the governments of Europe. I can't afford to have my name mixed up in a scandal and, what's more, I can bring influences to bear to prevent it from being introduced. You may be anything you like; whatever you are cuts no ice. I'm through with you and with whatever you may imagine took place on the Ryndam. You seem to think that I'm concealing a guilty knowledge that would enable you to bring this Gorlof woman to trial. You're on the wrong tack. I have no such knowledge. The longer you stay here, the more you waste my time.” The Major was on the point of answering when the telephone rang shrilly. Grateful for a diversion, Hindwood crossed the room. As he unhooked the receiver, he glanced across his shoulder, “Excuse me.”

“Is this Mr. Hindwood?”

“It is.”

It was the hotel operator asking.

“There's a call for you, sir. It's from some one who's not on a newspaper. Will you take it?”

“Certainly.”

There was a pause while the connection was being made; then a foreign voice, a woman's, questioned, “Eees thees Meester Hindwood? Eef you please, one meenute. A lady wants to talk wiz you.”

Coming across the distance, subdued and earnest, he caught the tones of a voice which was instantly familiar.

“Don't be startled. Don't answer me. There's a man with you. Tell him nothing. If you ever loved me, even for a second, don't believe a word he says.”

She had not been arrested! A wave of joy swept over him. The uncertainty as to whether she was arrested had been crushing him.

He waited, hoping she would speak again.

Shattering the spell with a touch of bathos, the operator inquired, “Number?”

With that he rang off. As he raised his head, he had the uncomfortable sensation that the Major had turned away from watching him.

VI

So you want to be rid of me!” The Major glanced across his shoulder, at the same time making no effort to remove himself.

Hindwood crossed the room thoughtfully and seated himself. “I've made no secret of it from the moment you entered.”

The Major laughed genially. “I don't blame you. You think I'm a wronged husband trying to get even, or else an unscrupulous detective baiting traps with falsehoods. The situation's unpleasant—for you, especially.”

“I'm glad you realize it.”

“I assure you I do. You've given yourself away completely.”

“You think so?”

“I don't think; I know. What you've told me proves beyond a doubt that you're possessed of exactly the knowledge that would bring Santa Gorlof to trial.”

“You're imaginative.”

“I'm observant. You're wondering what makes me so certain. The explanation's simple: I've studied Santa's tactics. Her strategy's the same in every instance. When a man suspects her guilt, she does what she did to you: seals his mouth with kisses.”

“This is too much.” Hindwood brought his fist down with a bang. “Do you go or do I have to force you?”

“This time I'll try one of yours.”

With astounding assurance the Major helped himself to one of Hindwood's cigars, which he had previously rejected. Without bravado he lighted it and, having ascertained that it was drawing, continued: “If you used force, you'd regret it. You'd make certain of the unwelcome publicity you're so anxious to avoid; you'd miss a stranger story than any Arabian tale that ever was concocted. You think you can still touch bottom; as a matter of fact you're already out of sight of land. You sit there looking an average, successful American; actually you've become an heroic figure, adrift upon an ocean so romantic and uncharted that it beats upon the cliffs of every human passion.”

Hindwood shifted uneasily. “So you're a fortuneteller in addition to being an ill-used husband and a detective!”

Ignoring his sarcasm, the Major proceeded: “Some time ago you accused me of ingenuity in the means I had adopted to recover my bachelorhood. It's not my bachelorhood, but my own and my country's honor that, with your help, I'm endeavoring to recover. That sounds extravagant? But consider—what motive could be sufficiently extravagant to compel a man to bend all his energies toward bringing the woman whom he loves to the scaffold? Because I say it calmly, you doubt that I love her. What man could help loving her? She's the last of a long line of false, fair women who've stirred up madness and left behind a trail of ruin.”

Rising wearily, Hindwood turned his back and commenced fingering the documents on his desk. “There'll be nothing gained by carrying this discussion further.”

With a question the Major recaptured his attention. “Did it ever strike you that she's partly Asiatic?”

Hindwood swung round, surprised into truth. “What makes you ask it?”

VII

Even to myself,” the Major sighed, “the story which I am about to tell sounds incredible. My reason for confiding it to a stranger is that, when you have heard it, you may dispense with chivalry and become stern enough to do your duty. To protect a woman, whatever her age or looks, is an instinct as primitive as religion. When she happens to be beautiful and the object of your affection, not to protect her is a kind of blasphemy. You and I, though you deny it, are both in love with Santa. I am her husband, while you are no more than her chance-met admirer. Yet you, in her hour of danger, are prepared to shield her with your honor, whereas I am among the most relentless of her pursuers.

“The best part of my life has been spent in India. I went there with my regiment when I was little more than a boy. The fascination of an ancient civilization took possession of my imagination. I became a student of it and soon acquired a knowledge of native habits which was more fitting to a secret agent than to a soldier. I learned to speak many dialects and could pass myself off as an Asiatic with the minimum amount of disguise. Instead of frequenting clubs and idling away my leisure in the usual round of social futilities which make up the average Anglo-Indian's life, I formed the practice of slipping out into the night and losing my identity in the teeming, Oriental shadow-world by which I was surrounded.

“On one of my wanderings—when or where it is not necessary to particularize—I strolled into a temple and saw a young girl dancing. As perhaps you know, girls are dedicated to the worship of certain gods and goddesses at a very early age. They are for the most part deities who symbolize fecundity; the ritual with which they are celebrated is gross. The temple girls are chosen for their beauty and are trained by the priesthood to perform sensual dances, which are as old as time. They are not nuns or priestesses; their social status, if they may be said to have any in a land where woman is at best a plaything, approximates to that of temple slaves. They are taken from their parents at an age when sahibs' children are in nurseries. From the moment they are dedicated, their minds and souls are left to stagnate; they are treated like performing animals—fed and drilled and degraded that they may employ their bodies with the utmost grace.

“This girl, the moment I saw her, impressed me as being the most fascinating human creature I had ever set eyes on. I had pressed in with the crowd from the evil-smelling, moonlit street. The temple was dim with the smoke of swaying censers. Its walls seemed vast with the flash of gold and jewels. At the far end, scarcely discernible, a huge god squatted, gloating and sinister. From somewhere in the shadows, swelling into frenzy, came the pounding of drums and the clash of barbaric music. Across the open pavement, between the god and the spectators, a chain of girls coiled and twisted like a snake.

“At the time I entered, the dance was nearly ended. It had evidently been going on for a long while. One by one the girls were slipping down exhausted. There they lay disordered, with their hair twined about them and their slim, bronze bodies twitching.

“But one girl danced on, ever quickening her pace, till she alone remained. She was like a streak of flame, a will-o'-the-wisp, a spring petal blown before the wind: she seemed the symbol of everything that is young and pagan. Her childish face was masked in an unchanging smile. Her lips were parted; her body gleamed golden among the muted lights. She stooped and darted like a lizard across her fallen comrades; with one leap she floated through the air, perched for a moment on the knees of the god, and vanished into his bosom. Instantly the censers were extinguished, and I was carried out into the evil-smelling street by the rush of the perspiring crowd.

“From that night it was as though I were bewitched. There was never an hour when that drifting blossom of a girl was absent from my mind. I idealized her into a nobility that was more than earthly. I flung aside all sense of caste and race. I forgot that I was a sahib and over thirty, whereas she was a dancing girl and little more than a child. I excused my infatuation on the ground of magnanimity, telling myself that if I could possess her, I could save her from certain degradation. Above all, I wanted to wipe out her houri's smile and to cause the soul to appear in her eyes. Every hour that I could spare, I disguised myself as a native and haunted the temple. At rare intervals I caught glimpses of her. And so six months went by.

“Gradually my desire strengthened into determination. I was insane with chivalry—utterly quixotic, as quixotic as you are now. I had raised her to such a pinnacle of worship that a liaison was not to be contemplated. What I planned was to carry her off and marry her. When you remember the gulf which the Anglo-Indian places between himself and the races he governs, you can estimate the measure of my madness. Such an act would entail resigning from my regiment and inviting social ostracism on every hand. It meant ruin, but to my impassioned mind no price seemed too high to pay.

“There was an old priest who, unknown to me, had observed my comings and goings. One evening he addressed me by name. While I was hesitating as to what could be his motive, he volunteered to obtain the girl for me if I would reward him with a sufficient bribe.

“Three nights later, as I waited, a door in the temple wall opened, and a muffled figure emerged. Without a word, obeying the instructions I had received, I turned away, and she followed. Through the sleeping city we crept, like a pair of shadows.

“In the European quarter I had secretly rented a bungalow which had long been deserted. It stood in a wilderness of overgrown shrubberies; a high wall went about it. Not until the rusty gate had closed behind us did I dare to acknowledge her presence; then, taking her in my arms, I carried her up the path to the unlighted house. We entered. There were just the two of us; I had not risked engaging servants. In the darkness I set her down and lighted a lamp. As the flame quickened and I knelt beside her, she uncovered her face. So far, I had seen her only distantly. It was the moment for which I had waited. Her face was white.”

The Major passed his hand across his forehead. His lips tightened. He betrayed every sign of a man doing his best to conceal an overpowering emotion. He leaned back and gazed up at the ceiling, blowing out a cloud of smoke. When he had watched it disperse, he turned to Hindwood with a deprecating smile.

“I hope I don't bore you. I'll omit the ardors and ecstasies of my love-affair and stick to the bare outline. What I discovered was that she was an Eurasian. She was fourteen years of age—a woman by Indian standards, but still a child by ours. Her eyes were gray, and her complexion was so light that, with any one but an expert, she could have passed for a European. There are millions of darkhaired women with her coloring to be found in any Latin country. Given the proper manners and a European setting, scarcely a soul would have suspected her. Certainly no one would dare to voice his suspicions who met her as my wife.

“Her history I pieced together from many conversations. Her father had been a tea-planter—an Englishman of good family. Her mother had been a Burmese. They both had died in a cholera epidemic; their half-caste child had been picked up from the highways and placed in the temple.

“Seeing that I was out to be chivalrous, I made up my mind to do the thing thoroughly. I hurried up a furlough that was due me and, taking her to France, placed her in a convent. My reason for choosing France was that, when she became my wife, there would be fewer chances of discovery if she passed as French instead of English. In the south, especially in Provence, there are many women of her type descended from the Saracens. If you've been to Arles, you must have noticed them. At the end of three years, when she was seventeen, I returned, married her, and took her back to India. If any one detected the deception, no one was bold enough to proclaim it. Every circumstance argued against such a surmise. She had forgotten much of the English she had known, and pretended to speak only French. I had coached her in her part; she acted it to perfection. By no hint or sign did she let the knowledge escape her that she could understand a word of any native dialect. So far as I am aware, she was accepted at her face value, as a young Provençal whom I had courted in her own country.

“For some time my romantic folly brought us nothing but happiness. We invented a legend to account for her family, which, through continual repetition, we almost came to believe ourselves. No two people were ever more in love. Despite our difference in age and the racial gulf which divided us, no man and woman ever seemed more wisely mated. Apparently whatever shameful knowledge she had acquired in the temple had been blotted out by her superimposed refinement. Even to me she betrayed no hint of grossness; she appeared to be as sweet and innocent as the girl I claimed her to be—the girl I said I had surprised in the passionless tranquility of a French convent.

“Her devotion to myself was pathetic—it verged on adoration. She was continually contriving new ways of rewarding me for the horrors from which I had saved her. To me the ground she trod was sacred. I delighted in making myself her slave. We competed with each other in generosity. With each of us the other's slightest whim was law. She was unbelievably beautiful, the most mysteriously beautiful woman in India. I was more than twice her years and the envy of every man who saw her. Her beauty seemed only the outshining of her goodness. Save for an accident, I should never have known otherwise.

“We had been married two years when she bore me a child. Our dread, when we knew that she was to become a mother, was that our offspring might reveal the Asiatic strain. We took every precaution to hide the fact, if this should happen. But even this was spared us. Our boy was blue-eyed and flaxen-haired as any Anglo-Saxon. She worshiped him. He seemed to symbolize Heaven's blessing on the lie we practiced. He was never out of her sight. In her fear lest he might develop some native characteristic, she refused to have an ayah and cared for him entirely. Wherever she went, she kept him with her; he slept in our room at night. So perfectly had she drilled herself that, up to this point, I can not recall an instance in which she had fallen below the level of a well-born white woman. It was the finest instinct in her nature that proved her undoing—her mother-love that trapped her into the self-revelation which produced our tragedy.

“Our child was a sturdy little fellow of nearly two, just beginning to run about, when suddenly he died. We had a house-party at the time. His mother was playing tennis. While she was playing, he was strangled and thrown down a well by a native servant who believed he had been slighted. My wife, missing the child, went in search of him in panic and caught the native in the act of getting rid of the body. Instantly she reverted to what her mother had been before her. Snatching the man's knife, she killed him before any of her guests could restrain her. In the abandonment of her grief, she became an out and out Burmese woman, scattering dust on her hair, beating her breasts, and rending her clothes with the wildest lamentations. The fiction of her French origin was utterly destroyed. There was no longer any doubt among those who witnessed her that I was married to an Eurasian.

“Our position at once became intolerable. A halfcaste is despised the world over, but in India especially. That night every servant left. None of our friends came near us. We sat alone with our grief in a deserted house. As her calmness returned, she grew tragically contrite—not contrite from any moral sense, but because she had given away our secret. She seemed incapable of appreciating that she had done any wrong in depriving justice of its victim. When I tried to explain to her that she had committed a crime, she shook her head impatiently, insisting that she had done what any mother ought to do under the circumstances. When I pressed the subject she became persuaded that I, too, was blaming her, and then that I had never properly loved either her or her child. And yet I think I never loved her more tenderly than at that moment.

“A week later, after miserable days and nights of suspense, we received our sentence. Native sedition was running high. The Government did not dare to bring the wife of a British officer to trial. Such a course would have proved too damaging to the prestige of Anglo-Indian officialdom. I was promised that the scandal would be hushed up and I should be given a new employment, if I would agree to ship her out of India at once and to see to it that she never returned. What it amounted to for me was perpetual separation and for her perpetual banishment.

“I have often tried to arrive at a sane conclusion as to how far I am the author of what she has become. Had I shared her banishment there can be little doubt that her white blood would have kept control of her poisoned heritage. Unfortunately I had a living to earn. Professionally I was broken. My savings were inconsiderable. I had her to maintain. I was past mid-life and by leaving India would have sacrificed the pension that was already in sight. Moreover, I knew of no way of marketing my training in any country outside India. So I played safe and bowed to authority. I resigned from my regiment and was transferred to the department of military intelligence. After knowing the security of a home and wife, at past forty I became a secret agent, a spy and a wanderer, a friendless and unfriendly man, unsociable and socially unacceptable. As for my wife, aged only twenty-one, she was exiled to England, a stranger in a gray, chill country, bankrupt in her happiness, with no one to defend her, taking with her the temptation of her unusual beauty and the treacherous inheritance of her intermingled blood.

“There seemed no justice in the world for either of us. The offending cause of our punishment was the protective motherhood which had prompted her to slay the killer of our child. But, to use your terse Americanism, we were 'up against' blind angers and racial prejudices, which no amount of bucking on our part could change. So far as she was concerned, even before her life had started, she had been condemned. The initial sin had been her parents' when they had allowed themselves to create her. Before she had seen daylight, the uncharity of mankind had proclaimed her a half-caste and a pariah. From her inherited fate I had tried to snatch her when I had bought her from the temple. You may say that my recklessness was nothing more than selfishness, pharisaically parading as chivalry; in allowing her to bear me a child, I had only reduplicated the crime of her parents. Nevertheless, I had tried to rescue her and could have succeeded, had not her mother-love ensnared her. She was betrayed by the purest instinct in her nature; she was shown no more leniency than if it had been the basest. There lay the cruelty that rankled. She was judged not by motives, but by results. She would have been pardoned and applauded, had she been a full-blooded white woman.

“In spite of all these accumulated injustices, I believe she would have retained the strength to go straight had there been any limit to our separation. There was none. For all the comfort that I could be to her, I might just as well have been dead or divorced from her. I was all that remained out of the ruin that had overtaken her, yet the most to which she could look forward, save for brief meetings at long intervals, was that I would be restored to her in my useless old age, when the glorious floodtide of her youth hud receded. You see I am sufficiently unbiased to be able to plead her case.”

The Major rose and, going over to the window, stood with his back toward Hindwood, gazing out into the night. Some minutes had elapsed, when he turned quietly.

“Where had I got to? Ah, yes! To where I had to send her to England! I accompanied her to Calcutta to see her safely on the liner. Shall I ever forget that journey? It had the gloom of a funeral and the frenzy of an elopement. Actually my rôle was that of a policeman deporting a miscreant who happened to be his wife. We tried to pack into moments the emotions of a lifetime. As background to our love-making was the poignant memory of the puzzled child, whom seven years earlier I had escorted on the same journey, en route for France, where she was to be made over into a sahib's lady. In her wondering attitude toward the fortunes that assailed her, she was little changed. She was still startlingly unsophisticated—a child-woman, dangerously credulous and deceivingly unversed in masculine wiles. I had taught her to be so dependent that I dared not imagine how she would do without me. She was so artless. She took such pleasure in admiration. Love was so necessary to her; it was the breath of her life. Its misuse had been the breath and the means of life of her Burmese mother before her.

“Her complete lack of comprehension that I in any way shared her sacrifice formed the most distressing part of my ordeal. She assumed that she was being exiled by ray choice. She persisted in talking as if she could stay, if I would only change my mind. Though she did not accuse me in words, she believed that I was ridding myself of her because she had disgraced me—that I was pushing her across the horizon, where she would be forgotten and out of sight. Up to the last moment she pleaded with and coaxed me, as though it were I who was refusing to repeal her sentence. The ship cast off, bearing her from me with her broken heart and her embittered memories of the newly-dug grave, while I turned back to ferret through the gutters of Asia, that I might earn the wherewithal to provide for her.

“At first she wrote many times a day; then every day; then regularly to catch each outgoing mail. In the whole of England she knew nobody. In her anger against British justice she wished to know nobody. She was inconsolable, bruised in spirit, and crushed in her pride. After the pomp and hubbub of the East, she found London drab and melancholy. From her lodgings in Kensington she poured out her soul on paper. Much of what she wrote consisted of memories, the tender trifles which a mother treasures about her child.

“Gradually, almost imperceptibly, there came a change. A querulous note crept in, a questioning of motives. Why had I sent her as far away as England? Why had I sent her away at all? If it were true that it was not I who had exiled her, why had I not accompanied her? Was it because I was tired and ashamed of her? It would have been kinder to have left her to dance in the temple. Then a new suspicion grew up, which betrayed an evil that I had never traced in her. With whom was I living? Some white woman? Was that why I had rid myself of her?

“What answers could I make? It was like arguing with a spiteful child. Our misunderstandings were as wide as the distance that separated us. She implored and finally demanded that I should join her. The more I stated obstacles, the more convinced she became that I was cruel, like all the sahibs who were torturing her—the proud sahibs who thought nothing of a murdered baby, when it was only the child of a half-caste woman.

“From then on her heart hardened, till at last I failed to recognize in her any resemblance to the gentle wife who had been so much my companion. She wrote vaguely about revenge, a revenge that should embrace the whole white race. Contempt should be repaid with despising, hatred with blows, blood with blood. Her beauty should be the weapon. She seemed to have gone mad. Suddenly her letters ceased. My remittances were returned; they had failed to reach her.

“For what follows I have but one explanation. By some species of unconscious hypnotism, so long as I had exerted physical influence over her, I had had the power to make the European in her predominate. As my influence weakened with time and distance, she relapsed into the woman she always would have been, if I had not found her: a smiling menace to the nobilities of both the races from which she was descended, a human jackal following the hunt. That sounds harsh? Then listen to the conclusion of my story.

“One day, six months after I had lost touch with her, I was glancing through an illustrated weekly when, on turning a page, I found her portrait gazing up at me. She was photographed in almost the attitude and attire in which I had first caught sight of her in the temple. The very setting was similar; behind her the huge god squatted, gloating and sinister—on her face was the unchanging houri's smile. On reading the text I discovered that she had leaped into instant fame as an exponent of Indian dancing. You will remember that in the last two years before the war the dance craze was at its height. She had been acclaimed a great artist; everything she said, did, and wore was fulsomely praised and described. There was no false reticence about either her or her admirers; she was frankly advertised as being possessed of the most beautiful body in Europe. She had given herself a French name and was announced as being of French ancestry. According to her printed biography, her father had been an orchid-hunter who had taken her with him on all his expeditions. On his last, in India, he had died; she had been kidnaped for her beauty and sold into the service of a Hindoo temple. From this bondage she had been rescued by an Englishman of title who had chivalrously restored her to her family in Marseilles. There was much more to the same effect—a jumble of perverted truth and romantic lies, precisely the kind of adventurous nonsense which appeals to the sensation-seeking public.

“From then on, via the press, I was always getting news of her. London, Paris, Berlin, St. Petersburg, each in turn went mad over her. She captivated a continent. Kings and emperors commanded her to appear before them. Her tours were royal triumphs. Little by little ugly rumors began to spread. There was a Parisian banker who, when he had lavished his all upon her, committed suicide, leaving his wife and children penniless. There was another scandal; it had to do with a Russian general who had betrayed his country. At his court-martial he poisoned himself when her name was introduced into the evidence. As though a conspiracy of silence had broken down, now that she began to be gossiped about, scandals gathered thick and fast. Each new one was more infamous than the last; out of each she emerged unpitying and smiling. It was only her victims who suffered. Her progress was marked by a trail of death and ruin. Nevertheless, infatuated by the exquisiteness of her body, men fluttered about her unceasingly, like moths, shriveling their souls in the flame of her fascination. When the peace of the world was violated by the Germans—”

Hindwood leaned forward, tapping the Major's knee. “I can spare you your eloquence. The rest of your story is common property. The woman you describe stole the Allies' anti-submarine defense plans from her lover. He was a British naval officer, temporarily in Paris. She was caught red-handed. There was a sentimental agitation in her favor—an attempt to argue that as a physical masterpiece of feminine perfection she ought to be exempted. It accomplished nothing. She was a German spy, who had sold men's lives for profit. She received and deserved no more mercy than a rag-picker. After having been encouraged in her sins because of her unrivaled loveliness, she was led out at dawn in the woods of Vincennes, where the body which had maddened thousands of eyes was riddled with bullets.”

The Major's lips were smiling crookedly. “How could she have been riddled with bullets,” he questioned, “when you crossed the Atlantic in her company?”

Hindwood shrugged his shoulders. “If you insist on propounding conundrums, it's up to you to supply the answers.”

“I can supply them. The person executed in the woods of Vincennes was not a woman.”

“That's a daring assertion. Who was it?”

“A distinguished French officer, a man who had been crippled in defending his country and held the highest awards for gallantry. In pre-war days he had been an old flame of hers, whom she had abandoned with more than her ordinary callousness. On hearing of her predicament, he begged to be allotted the duty of seeing that her sentence was properly executed. The reason he gave was that he might clear himself of the taint of ever having associated with a traitress. He was put in charge of the guard on her last night. Making use of his opportunity, he exchanged clothing with her and—”

Hindwood stifled a yawn. “You expect me to believe this?”

The Major mastered his anger. “I expect you to believe nothing. I'm here to state facts and to warn you that your friend, who now calls herself Santa Gorlof, is the same woman. My appeal to you for assistance in bringing her to justice is both personal and patriotic. I am her husband; my honor is involved. I am also an Englishman; all her intrigues, even this last, in which Prince Rogovich met his fate, are aimed against the friends of England—one of whom, I may remind you, is your own great nation. All I can say is that each man has his separate standard of loyalty. For me, an old soldier, my devotion to my country is more important than my compassion for an erring woman.”

Hindwood rose. Uncomfortably, against his will, he had been impressed by the stoical dignity of his persistent guest. “You deserve that I should be frank with you. Here's the truth—I accept very little of what you've told me. Either you've mistaken my traveling companion for another woman, or else you've been trying to prejudice me with a fantastic story. But even though I accepted your supposed revelation, I should refuse to help you. On your own showing, you're endeavoring to bring the mother of your child to the scaffold. I should respect you more if you left her fate to other hands. Disbelieving you, as I do, I regard the introduction of Miss Gorlof's name into the discussion as rank impertinence. Your coupling of my name with hers increases the cowardice of your discourtesy. If you had convinced me and I were eager to assist you, I couldn't. I know nothing about her—our acquaintance was the most casual. In all probability I've seen her for the last time; I haven't the vaguest notion where she's to be found. If your half-caste vampire actually escaped the bullets in the woods of Vincennes, I advise you to search for her in another direction. You may take my word for it that if Santa Gorlof learns of your activities, you'll find yourself in trouble. I reckon myself some judge when it comes to character.”

The Major drew out his silk handkerchief from his breast pocket and flicked a speck of dust from his immaculate white spats. With the utmost deliberation he recovered his hat and gloves. For a few seconds he gazed out of the window thoughtfully; then, turning slowly, he crossed the room. With his hand on the door knob, he glanced back solemnly. He passed his fingers across his lips and cleared his throat. “When she has added you to her list of victims, if she gives you time before she kills you, remember that I warned you.”

When Hindwood had recovered sufficiently from his surprise to follow him out into the passage, every sign of his unwelcome visitor had vanished.

He had scarcely closed the door and reseated himself, when again there came a tapping.

CHAPTER THE THIRD—HE PLUNGES INTO ROMANCE

I

HINDWOOD consulted his watch; the hour was nearing midnight. He was surprised to discover how the time had flown. The tapping outside his door continued. There was nothing hurried about it, nothing impatient. On the other hand, there was nothing humble. It was a secret, intimate kind of tapping, like the signaling of a woman to her lover. It would cease for a minute, so that he began to hope that he was to be left in quiet; then it would recommence.

He sat obstinately at bay, almost holding his breath, not daring to move lest he should betray that he had noticed. He was determined not to admit this new disturber. He had had enough of danger warnings and revengeful husbands. The only danger that he greatly dreaded was the loss of a second night's rest.

The sound was getting on his nerves. It was so irritatingly discreet and importunate. At first he had tried to believe that his caller was a hotel employee, but a servant would have taken silence for an answer a good five minutes ago. If it had been any one who had a right to be there, the tapping would have been bolder. Whoever it was, it was some one who had correctly estimated his mood.

Tap-a-tap, tap-a-tap. An interval, and then, tap-a-tap.

Getting stealthily to his feet, he tiptoed to the threshold and flung wide the door.

“I beg your pardon.” He caught her arm as she stumbled back. “I guess I startled you.”

“Shish!” She pressed a finger to her lips. “Let me inside, so that I can sit down.”

Giving her his arm, he led her to a chair. Having returned and closed the door, he surveyed her at his leisure.

She had the appearance of a peasant woman dressed in her Sunday best, yet so great was her dignity, she did not seem out of place in her surroundings. She was very aged; her figure was shapeless and bowed. Her gray hair was cropped like a boy's; she wore spread over it, knotted at the throat, a neatly folded kerchief of white linen. She was clad in a black gown of the utmost plainness. Nothing distracted attention from her face, which was as stoical with endurance as a gladiator's. You could almost trace the riverbeds her tears had worn. The fist of fate had punched it flat. It was a ruin to which violence had done its worst, but had failed to destroy its gentleness. And he had expected Santa. Instead of feminine frailty, spurring weak desires, there had come this woman, iron of will, broken in body, ravished by years, with her tremendous impression of moral strength. As she sat before him, her gnarled hands resting on her cane, pushing back the weight of her ancient shoulders, she raised to him the dim valiance of her eyes. “What can I do for you?” he questioned. “Nothing.” She swung her head from side to side with the brooding fierceness of a decrepit lioness. “It is you whom I have come to help.”

“I!” he smiled. “I think you are mistaken.”

“I am never mistaken.” She gazed at him intently. “I have come to help you to act generously. You have it in your power to save a woman, perhaps at the sacrifice of yourself.”

He laughed quietly. “You mean Santa Gorlof. I wonder when I'm to hear the last of her. A secret service man has spent the past two hours instructing me what I can do for her. You must have met him. He had scarcely left when you began to tap. He tried to convince me that if I didn't protect myself by giving him information which would lead to her arrest, my name would be added to her list of victims. A pleasant sort of threat! I'm afraid he found me, as you will probably find me, disappointing. I'm not possessed of any incriminating information, and I don't place any faith in her list of victims. She struck me as being a very gracious and fascinating woman. Beyond that I have no opinion about her, either for or against.”

The old head sank further forward; the dim eyes became searching. “Then you told him nothing?”

“I knew nothing to tell.”

There followed a deep silence, during which they gazed fixedly at each other. She sighed contentedly, nodding her approval. “So you are in love with her! That makes things easier. Even to me you lie—to me who am her friend!”

“I deny that I am in love with her, but what makes you think so?”

“She thinks so.”

“Then you come directly from her?”

He had been unable to keep back the eagerness from his voice. Instantly he realized his indiscretion. Pulling up a chair, he seated himself opposite her, that he might lose nothing of her changes of expression.

“You're the second unconventional visitor,” he said, “whom I've received this evening. The object of both your visits seems to be the same—to associate my name with that of a lady to whom I am comparatively a stranger. We may have conversed together a couple of dozen times; when we parted, I never expected to hear from her. Within the space of twenty-four hours a man who claims to be her husband comes to me accusing her of every infamy. No sooner has the door closed behind him than you enter, asserting that I am in love with her. You must pardon me if I begin to suspect a plot. For all I know, you may be my first visitor's accomplice, employing a more disarming method to get me to commit myself. You tell me you are Santa Gorlof's friend; you might equally well say you are her grandmother—you offer me no proof. If she's really in trouble, I'm sorry. But I fail to see any way in which I can serve her.”

“If there were no way, I should not have troubled you, especially at this late hour. As for her being in danger, she has always been in danger. She was born into the world like that. I am old—very old. I have no traces of it left, but I, too, was once beautiful.”

The trembling hands fumbled at the white linen kerchief, loosening the knot against her neck. “Ah, yes, I was beautiful. But I did not come to you to speak of that. My friend, you are good; I saw that the moment I entered. I said to myself, 'There is the man who could understand our Santa and make her honorable like himself.' The world has given her no chance—no, never. The husband who should have cared for her tossed her aside like an old shoe when, like all animals robbed of their young, she struck out in self-defense. I see you have heard that—how her child was murdered and she was sent into exile for taking justice into her own hands. Doubtless you have heard much else. She is a woman who would have done no harm to any one if she had been allowed to remain a mother. But because they scoffed at her motherhood, all her goodness has turned to wickedness. Using her body as a decoy, she has slain men of the race that persecuted her. Because she could not get her child back, she has become an outlaw, making society pay for her loneliness.”

She paused, watching her effect.

Hindwood had not removed his eyes from hers. His face was troubled. “I don't think you know what has been told me. The man who introduced himself to me as her husband said that she was a half-caste, a temple dancing-girl, who to revenge herself had poisoned white men's happiness and during the war had become an international spy, working against the Allies. He made the assertion that she was responsible for the vanishing of Prince Rogovich. If these things are so, how can I, a decent, self-respecting man—”

Bending forward, the old lady clutched his hand. “It was decent, self-respecting men who made her what she is to-day.”

He released his hand quietly. “You have not denied any of the accusations which are brought against her. And yet, remembering her face, I can not believe that she is bad. You want me to save her. If by that you mean that you want me to pledge myself not to give evidence against her, you may tell her from me that I have no evidence.”

“I don't mean that.”

“Then what?”

“I want you to declare to me that you love her. No, listen. There is still something in her that is pure. You have made her conscious of it. You can undo the wrong that has been done her and make her the woman she should be, if you choose.”

Hindwood rose from his seat and paced the room. Suddenly he halted and swung round. “How did you know that I desired her? Until you came, I scarcely realized it myself. Why should you have appointed yourself to tempt me—you, who are so old? Between sane people, what would be the use of my telling you that I loved her? Though I refused to believe any of the libels against her which even you seem to credit, there are two facts which it does not seem possible to escape: that she is married and that the police are on her track. I have been warned that when she traps men, she commences by appealing to their chivalry. That's what's happening now. Do you see where you place me? If she is falsely accused, I brand myself a coward by running away from her. If she is guilty, I endanger my good name by having any more to do with her. What I am waiting to hear you say is that this is a case of mistaken identity—that she is willing and able to prove it.”

“Will you help me out of my chair?”

When she was on her feet, she let go his arm and commenced to move across the room.

“Where are you going?”

“To give her your message.”

“I've told you nothing.”

“You've told me that you love her.”

She was on the point of leaving. With quiet decision he put his back against the door, preventing her from opening it.

“Madam,” he said, “old as you are, you owe me some consideration. Before you go, I at least have a right to ask your name.”

She smiled wistfully. The harshness in her face was replaced by a glow of tenderness. “Yes, you have the right. I am called 'the Little Grandmother.' I am a readjuster of destinies—the champion of the down-trodden. I fight for those for whom the world has ceased to care.”

“But what have you to do with Santa?”

“She has been oppressed.”

“And because she has been oppressed, you overlook any crimes she may have committed?”

“I am not God, that I should judge. If people's hearts are empty, I reckon them my children.”

“Let me ask you one more question. Did Santa tell you that she loved me?”

The old head shook sorrowfully. “To act nobly it is not necessary to be loved in return. Let me go. Do not try to follow me.”

Standing aside, he opened the door. “And we meet again?”

As she hobbled out, she glanced across her shoulder. In her gesture there was the ghostly grace of the proud coquette who was vanishing and forgotten. “Will you want to,” she whispered, “to-morrow?”

II

Now that she was gone he realized that under the hypnotic influence of her presence he had revealed far more than he had intended. He should never have allowed her to escape him. He should have insisted on accompanying her. She had afforded him his only clue to Santa's whereabouts.

At all costs he must see Santa. His peace of mind depended on it. The thought of her would haunt him. He would never rest until he had arrived at the truth. Probably, until he had seen her, he would never be free from the mischief-making intrusions of anonymous intriguers. He dodged the theory of her guilt, preferring to persuade himself that a conspiracy was afoot, the object of which might be blackmail. More likely it was a clever move on the part of financial rivals to thwart his plans by discrediting him. If he could meet Santa, he would know for certain whether she was a decoy or a fellow-victim. Whatever his intellect might suspect, his heart resolutely acquitted her.

It was too late to overtake the Little Grandmother, but he was determined to do his best to trace her. In the passage he discovered a solitary individual collecting boots and shoes, which had been placed for cleaning outside the neighboring doors.

“An old lady left my room a few moments ago. She had short hair and a white handkerchief tied over her head. No doubt you saw her.”

The man rose from his stooping posture. “An old lady with short hair! You say she had a handkerchief tied over it? It doesn't sound like the Ritz. No, I did not see her.”

Of the man at the elevator he made the same inquiry, only to be informed that several old ladies had been carried up and down.

Descending to the foyer, he presented himself at the desk.

“Isn't it your rule to have all callers announced before they're shown in on your guests?”

“Most decidedly.”

“Then how did it happen that an old lady, a rather curious old lady, with short hair and a white handkerchief over her head like a shawl, was allowed to' find her way into my room?”

“If you'll give me the particulars, I'll have the staff on duty questioned.”

As he turned away, he threw back across his shoulder: “I shan't be going to bed yet. If you discover anything you might report it.”

Half an hour later he was summoned to the telephone. “About your visitor, sir; no one saw her.” Far into the early hours of the morning he sat cogitating. What steps ought he to take to protect himself? He could place his case in the hands of the police, but if he did, he might stir up a hornet's nest. Most certainly he would be compelled to postpone his business on the Continent and to prolong his stay in England. But more disastrous than personal inconvenience, in going to the police he might be the means of putting Santa's enemies on her track. They would expect him to make a clean breast of everything; he would find difficulty in inventing convincing motives to explain the shiftiness of his conduct since landing.

If he could speak to Santa, he would know how to act. If she were really implicated in the Rogovich affair, his best way of helping her would be to clear out of England. But if she could assure him of her innocence, he was prepared to stay and back her to the limit of his capacity. Across the jet-black sky the silver moon drifted like a water-lily—a parable of Santa, moving immaculately among rumors of darkest misdoings. Whatever she had done had not quenched her purity. If she had done the worst of which she was accused, her perverted mother-love still clothed her with the tatters of a tragic goodness.

He jerked himself irritably back to reality. How could a woman who had spread death with her beauty still retain her purity? He had been warned that she trapped men by appealing not to their baseness, but to their chivalry. What wild-eyed feat of chivalry was this that he was performing? It was best to dispense with casuistry. The accumulated slanders to which he had listened had spurred his curiosity. They had changed a modishly attractive woman into a romantic figure—a figure which, if it were not noble, at least possessed the virtue of lonely courage.

He would allow himself four days in England. If he had not heard from her by then, he would go about his business. Having to this extent set a limit to his difficulties, he took himself off to bed.

III

His first anxiety next morning was to scan the papers. He had all the London dailies brought to him and read them before he dressed. For the most part they told him nothing new, merely recording, with varying degrees of sensationalism, the indisputable fact that Prince Rogovich had vanished. One or two hinted at foul play. Several suggested accidental drowning. The bulk of them, and among these were the most reputable, presumed that the Prince had had private reasons for avoiding England and landing at a Continental port incognito. Santa Gorlof's name was not mentioned. He found nothing to confirm the warnings of last night or to alarm himself on her account.

It was later, while eating breakfast with the Times propped up before him, that he came across an item which set him viewing what had happened from a new angle. He was skipping through a sketch of the Prince's career, when he stumbled on the following paragraph: “It will be remembered how last summer the Polish women's sense of injustice concentrated in a silent protest. For an entire week, day and night, never less than a thousand mothers, each carrying a dead child in her breast, camped about the Rogovich Palace in Warsaw.”

Glancing back, he read more carefully the information which led up to the paragraph: “During the two years following the close of the war, Poland, together with most of Central Europe, has suffered intensely from famine. Children have contributed by far the largest proportion to the toll of death. For much of this, so far as Poland is concerned, Prince Rogovich has been held accountable. The national wealth which he has squandered on equipping armies might have been spent more profitably in purchasing foodstuffs. The trip to America, from which he was returning at the time of his mysterious disappearance, is said to have had as its object the floating of a loan which would enable his Generals to maintain their offensives for at least another twelve months. While the land-owning party in Poland, supported by French diplomacy, backed him up, his imperialistic policies were bitterly condemned by Polish mothers who had to watch their children perishing from starvation in order that frontiers might be extended. Already the death-rate was so high that it was impossible to supply sufficient coffins. At mid-day the main streets of Warsaw were jammed with funerals. Many of these funerals consisted of only two persons: a man and woman, themselves weak from want of nourishment, staggering under the puny load of a bundle wrapped in paper, containing the body of the latest son or daughter to die of hunger.” Then followed the brief description of how the thousand Polish mothers had camped for a week in protest about the Prince's palace.

Hindwood looked up from his paper, gazing across the flashing gulf of sunlight to where the azure sea of distant sky beat against the embattled strand of housetops. If Santa had pushed the Prince overboard, had that been her motive—that Polish children might no longer die of hunger? Perhaps always, if indeed she had killed men, her purpose had been to act as the scourge of the enemies of children. The memory of her own dead child had urged her. Mistakenly, but none the less valiantly, she had constituted herself the avenger of all mothers who had been despoiled by masculine callousness.

What round-about journeys he was willing to undertake if only he might excuse her! Even though he were compelled to admit her guilt, he was determined to adjudge her magnanimous. At any rate, she had not been apprehended.

With a lighter heart than he had experienced for some hours, he dismissed her from his thoughts and set out to fulfill his round of engagements.

It was three o'clock when he returned. Immediately, on entering his room he noticed that a sheet of writing-paper had been pinned conspicuously to the pillow of his bed. Its evident purpose was to attract his attention. On approaching it, he saw that the message which it contained was printed in large letters and unsigned. It read:

“If you wish to see her, follow but do not speak to the widow.”

It didn't make sense. What widow? The “her” whom he could see by following the widow referred presumably to Santa. But who had pinned the sheet of paper to his pillow? How had this person gained access to his rooms? That morning, when he went out, he had locked his door and left his key at the hotel desk. He had in his possession confidential papers of almost state importance. If their secrets were shared, he might just as well pack up and return to America. His sense that he was the storm-center of a conspiracy strengthened.

Seizing his hat and gloves, he hurried down-stairs. He had just time to lodge a complaint with the management before keeping his next appointment.

He had alighted from the elevator and was about to cross the foyer, when a woman rose from a chair near by and passed immediately in front of him. He jerked himself up with a murmured apology; then noticed that she was gowned in the heaviest widow's mourning. A coincidence, he thought, and yet not so very extraordinary! He was proceeding on his journey, when his eyes chanced to follow her. She had halted uncertainly, as though she had forgotten something; by the poise of her head, he guessed that behind her veil she was gazing at him. More to satisfy his curiosity than as the preface to an adventure, he also halted. Somewhat ostentatiously he drew from his pocket the sheet of note-paper which he had found pinned to his pillow. Unfolding it, he reread its printed message:

“If you wish to see her, follow but do not speak to the widow.”

He looked up. Slowly, almost imperceptibly, the veiled figure nodded. He made a step, as if to approach her. Instantly she turned and passed out.

Without further consideration, in his eagerness to see what she would do next, he followed.

IV

He had expected that outside the hotel, in the throng of anonymous traffic, she would wait for him. Without giving any further sign that she was aware of him, she moved quietly through the fashionable crowd of Piccadilly and turned into the sunlit leisure of St. James Street. The unconscious gaiety of her way of walking was strangely out of keeping with her garments of bereavement. Hindwood's curiosity was piqued. In a shamefaced way he was overwhelmingly interested. He felt himself capable of a great romance. For the moment he was almost grateful for the annoyances that had presented him with so thrilling an opportunity.

What was he meant to do? The message had forbidden him to accost her. He had been ordered merely to follow. How long and whither? At the Foreign Office a high official was waiting for him, expecting every minute to hear him announced. To wander through London after an unknown woman was the trick of a gallant or a moonstruck boy. He was neither. He was a man of discretion, who aimed at becoming the advisor of statesmen and yet his conduct was open to every misinterpretation. He began to feel himself a scoundrel. For a man whose emotions had always been shepherded, the sensation was exciting and not wholly unpleasant.

If he could only learn something about her! Crossing to the opposite pavement, he hurried his pace till he was abreast of her.

She was young. Her figure was slight and upright. She was about the same build as Santa, but seemed taller. If she were indeed Santa, this impression of added height might be due to the somberness of her attire. She was so carefully veiled that even her hair was hidden; there was no feature by which he could identify her. He tried another experiment. Recrossing the street to a point some distance ahead, he loitered before a shop, making a self-conscious pretense of studying its wares. He heard the rustle of her crêpe as she drew near him. She went by him so closely that she almost touched him. He was conscious of the faint fragrance of her perfume. In the window he caught the dim reflection of her figure. At the moment that she was immediately behind him, she moved her head in a backward gesture, seeming to indicate that he should follow. When he turned to obey, she was drifting through the September sunshine, completely self-absorbed and unnoticing.

Traveling the yard of St. James Palace, she entered the Mall. There she hesitated, giving him time to catch up with her. A taxi was crawling by. She hailed it. Addressing the driver, but glancing directly at himself, she said in a sweet, distinct voice:

“Victoria Station. The Brighton platform.”

V

Was she Santa? The voice had sounded different, yet, had his life depended on it, he could not have decided. There was only one way of finding out—by joining her on the Brighton platform. This would mean missing his appointment at the Foreign Office. He was prepared to make the sacrifice, but he had no guarantee that the chase would end there. It was possible that she would still refuse to satisfy his curiosity and compel him to accompany her further. His rôle was that of the incautious fly. But who was the master-spinner of this web in which it was intended that he should become entangled? Was it the Little Grandmother? He had asked her whether they would meet again. In the light of present happenings, her answer took on a sinister meaning, “Will you want to to-morrow?”

As he stood there in the sunshine of the Mall, with the thud of fashionable equipages flashing by, a sullen conviction grew up within him that he was becoming afraid. An empty taxi hove in sight. He beckoned. Before it had halted, he was standing on the running-board.

“To Victoria Station. The Brighton platform.” The driver took his brevity for a sign that a train was to be caught by the narrowest of margins. He made such speed that they drew up against the curb just as the widow's vehicle was departing. She threw him a furtive glance from behind her veil, then turned and moved away as though he were the completest stranger. Imitating her discretion, he followed at a distance.

Halting before the ticket-office, she produced her purse. He edged nearer; it was necessary that he should learn her destination.

“A first-class single to Seafold,” he heard her say.

When his turn came, he repeated her words, adding: “How long before it starts?”

“Five minutes,” the clerk told him.

As he gathered up his change, he was surprised to observe how little was left out of his pound. He had supposed Seafold would prove to be a suburb. By the cost of his ticket he estimated that it must be a journey of at least sixty miles. Was it worth the taking? Could he return that same evening? He might get stranded. If that happened, he was unprepared to spend the night. These considerations were swept aside when he noticed that the widow had once more vanished.

Accosting a porter, “The Seafold platform?” he asked breathlessly.

“Same as the one for Brighton.”

“That tells me nothing. There's no luggage. Show me.”

Before he had passed the barrier, he was aware that the train was crowded. In third-class compartments passengers were standing. To discover any one under these circumstances would be a labor of patience. Carriage-doors were being banged and locked. Even at this final moment his habitual caution reasserted itself. What else but folly could result from an adventure so recklessly undertaken?

The porter caught him by the arm. “'Ere you are, mister. 'Op in. You're lucky.”

No sooner had he squeezed himself into the remaining seat than, with a groaning jerk, the train started.

VI

Lucky! The luckiest thing that could have happened to him would have been to be left behind. Here he was, following a woman whose face he had not seen, to a place which, up to a few moments ago, he had not known existed. Even to believe that he was following her required optimism; he had no proof that she was on the train. Probably it had been part of her strategy to send him scurrying on this fool's errand, in order that her accomplices might be undisturbed while they ransacked his rooms in his absence.

“I'll make an end of this nonsense,” he told himself, “by alighting at the next stopping-place.”

But where was the next stopping-place? He glanced along the double row of his fellow-passengers, barricaded behind their papers. He wanted to ask his question and watched for an opportunity. At last, losing patience, he nudged the man beside him.

“Excuse me, sir; I'm a stranger. I've made a mistake. My ticket's to Seafold, wherever that may be, and I—”

With his nose still glued to the page, the man muttered: “That's all right. You don't need to worry. It's where you're going.”

“But it isn't all right,” Hindwood contradicted with a shade of annoyance. “I don't want to go to Seafold; I want to return to London. What I'm trying to ask you is where can I get out?”

“Lewes, if you think it's worth while.”

“Why shouldn't I think it's worth while?”

The paper rustled testily and was raised a few inches higher. “Because Lewes is almost at Seafold. It's the junction where you change—the one and only stop between here and Brighton.”

Turning away disgustedly, he watched the swiftly changing landscape. Everything that met his eyes was beautiful, with a domestic, thought-out, underlying tenderness. It had all been planned, that was what he felt, by the loving labor of countless generations. In a homeless man like himself the sight created a realization of forlornness. He had traveled five continents and had planted his affections nowhere. It was the same with his human relations. He could reckon his acquaintances by the thousand, yet there was no one to whom he was indispensably dear. By a mental transition, the implication of which he scarcely appreciated, he began to think of Santa.

They were slowing down. He was surprised to discover that an hour had gone by. The man at his side folded up his paper. Now that they were about to part, he considered it safe to be friendly.

“We're coming into Lewes,” he said with a smile. “The Seafold train will be waiting just across the platform. You can't miss it.”

Hindwood thanked him brusquely.

What to do next? If he were fortunate in catching an express, he could be in London in time to dine. As he stepped out, he saw the Seafold local waiting. What good would it do him to go to Seafold? Yet to quit now would be humiliatingly unadventurous. He was moving slowly towards the stair, when he was arrested by a voice.

“If you wouldn't mind? It was stupid of me to drop it.”

He turned sharply. She was leaning out of a carriage window which he was in the act of passing.

Without giving him time to question, she explained: “My ticket—it slipped from my hand. There it is behind you.”

The moment he had stooped and returned it, she withdrew herself. It had happened so quickly that he had no chance to guess at the features behind the heavy veil. With a promptitude of decision which almost deceived himself, as though he had never harbored any other intention, he opened the door and clambered into the carriage next to hers.

“That's that,” he thought, smiling tolerantly at his relieved sense of satisfaction. And then, “It was no accident. She saw that I was giving up the chase. She did it to keep me going. What's her game?”

Whatever her game was, he was well on the road to enlightenment. The engine was puffing through a valley, across salt-marshes intersected by dykes and sluggish streams, where derelict boats lay sunken in the mud, rotting among the wild-flowers. Grazing sheep made the quiet plaintive with their cries. Gulls, disturbed by the train's impetuous onrush, rose and drifted lazily into the peace that slumbered further inland. Of a sudden, with a gesture of exaltation, the gleaming chalk-cliffs of the coast leaped into sight and beyond them the dull flash of the Channel.

He was clamorous with excitement. Curiosity beat masterfully on the door of the future. He had to find out. Why had he been brought here? What had Santa to do with it? Who was the woman in the next compartment?

They had halted several times. Each time he had watched carefully to see whether she was eluding him. Again their speed was slackening. They were entering a little, sandy town, dotted with red-brick villas, bleached by the wind and sun. He caught glimpses between the houses of a battered esplanade, of concrete breakwaters partly destroyed, of a pebbly beach alternately sucked down and quarrelsomely hurled back by the waves. Over all hung the haunting fragrance of salt, and gorse, and wild thyme.

They had come to a standstill. Passengers were climbing out and greeting friends. A porter flung wide the door of his carriage, shouting, “Seafold! Seafold!”

Having watched her alight, he followed. She was a few paces ahead, picking her way daintily through the crowd. Again she was all discretion and gave no hint that she had noticed him. Outside the gate, cabmen offered themselves for hire. She shook her head denyingly and passed on with her tripping step. Not until the station had been left behind did he remember that he ought to have inquired at what times the trains departed for London. Too late! His immediate business was keeping her in sight.

With the unhesitating tread of one familiar with her surroundings, she chose what seemed to be the most important street. It was narrow and flanked by little, stooping cottages, most of which had been converted into shops which cater to the needs of tourists. It was the end of the season. A few remaining visitors were sauntering aimlessly up and down. Natives, standing in groups, had the appearance of being fishermen. Some of them nodded to her respectfully; without halting, she passed them with a pleasant word. At the bottom of the street she turned into a road, paralleling the sea-front, which led through a waste of turf and sand into the wind-swept uplands of the open country. Just where the country met the town there stood a lath-and-plaster house, isolated, facing seaward, creeper-covered, surrounded by high hedges. It was more pretentious than any he had seen as yet. Giving no sign that she was aware she was followed, she pushed open the rustic gate, passed up the red-tiled path, produced a latch-key, and admitted herself. There, in the bare stretch of road, having lured him all the way from London, without a single backward glance or any sign that would betray her recognition of his presence, she left him.

VII

Just what I might have expected,” he said aloud.

“Did you speak ter me, mister?”

He swung round to find a freckled, bare-legged urchin gazing up at him.

“I didn't. Who are you?”

“A caddy from them links over there.” He pointed a grubby finger along the road to where, half a mile away, the level of the seashore swept up into a bold, green headland.

“Then I guess you're the sort of boy I'm looking for. Who lives in this house?”

“A Madam Something or other. 'Er name sounds Russian.”

“What does she look like?”

“Dunno. She's a widder and covers 'erself up. Not but what she 'as gentlemen friends as visits 'er.”

“You seem a sharp boy. Can you tell me how long she's lived here?”

“Maybe a year; off and on that's ter say. I don't recolleck.”

“Is she by herself?”

“There's an old woman in the garden sometimes as looks a 'undred. She wears a white hanky tied round 'er 'ead.”

“I think that's all I want to ask you. Here's something for you. Oh yes, do you happen to know about the trains to London?”

“The last one's gorn, mister, if that's what yer means. It's the one that our gents at the golf-links aims ter catch.”

“Then I'm out of luck. Good evening, sonny, and thank you for your information.”

The bare legs showed no signs of departing; the freckled face still gazed up.

“What's interesting you. My way of speaking? I'm American.”

The boy shook his head. “We 'ad Canadian soldiers 'ere during the war; they're pretty near Americans.”

“Then what is it?”

“It's that you're the second gent to-day to slip me a shilling for telling 'im about this 'ouse. And it's something else.” He sank his voice to a whisper. “Don't look round. There's been some one a-peeking from be'ind a bedroom winder most of the time as we've been talkin'. I'd best be goin'. Good evenin', mister.”

Not to attract attention by loitering, Hindwood set off at a businesslike pace down the road toward the headland. As he drew further away from the house, he walked more slowly; he was trying to sort out his facts. The woman who lived there had a Russian name. Santa Gorlof! She dressed like a widow. That would be to disguise herself. The news about the gentlemen friends who visited her was quite in keeping with the character which the Major had bestowed on her, but not at all welcome. She had lived there for a year, off and on. Her companion was an old woman, nearly a hundred—the Little Grandmother! But who was this man who earlier in the day had bribed the boy that he might obtain precisely the same information? He reminded himself that the police were hunting for her. The man might be a detective. If justice had already run her to earth, Seafold was the last place in which he ought to be found. If the boy had been accurate about the trains, there was no escape till the morning. Even though he were to hire an automobile, he would be placing his visit to Seafold on record. Self-preservation rose up rampant. What a fool he'd been to involve himself in so perilous an affair!

And yet, once more and for the last time, he longed to see Santa's face. Why was it? Was it because her hearsay wickedness fascinated him? It was not because he loved her. It was not to gratify morbid curiosity—at least not entirely. Perhaps it was because he pitied her and, against his will, discovered a certain grandeur in her defiance. She had played a lone hand. Like a beast of prey in the jungle, she was surrounded; at this moment she must be listening for the stealthy tread of those who were encompassing her destruction, yet she had not lost her cunning. She was fighting to the end. Probably this time, as when the firing-squad waited for her in the woods of Vincennes, she was planning to employ a man as her substitute—himself. The fact remained that in her desperate need, she had appealed to him for help. There was the barest chance that she was innocent—a victim of false-appearing circumstances. He wanted to judge her for himself by tearing aside the widow's veil and gazing on her destroying beauty.

Turning off the road, he struck across the links, climbing toward the towering headland. The wind, coming in gusts, rustled the parched gorse and brittle fronds of bracken. Behind his back the sun was setting, flinging a level bar of gold across the leaden sea. In sudden lulls, when the wind ceased blowing, the air pulsated with the rhythmic cannonading of waves assaulting the wall of cliffs. When he listened intently, he could hear the ha-ha of their cheering and their sullen moan as they were beaten back. It was strange to think that two weeks ago he had been in New York, intent on nothing but acquiring a fortune. Women had not troubled him. Why should he now permit this woman, chance-met on ship-board, to divert him—a woman who could never be closer to him?

He had reached the summit of the promontory. Etched against the sky-line, his figure must be visible for miles. The sun sank lower and vanished. Gazing through the clear atmosphere, far below him he could discern every detail of the house to which he had been tempted. It looked a fitting nest for an old poet. It held no hint of terror. At the same time it was strategically well situated for occupants who wished to keep an eye on all approaches.

He had been watching for any sign of movement, when a curious thing happened. Though no figure appeared, from one of the upper windows a white cloth fluttered. He shaded his eyes with his hand. The signal was repeated. He tapped his breast and pointed, as much as to say, “Shall I come?” The cloth was shaken vigorously. On repeating the experiment, he obtained the same result. When he nodded his head in assent, the fluttering ended.

So every step of his progress had been observed by some one spying through a telescope from behind the curtained windows! The first moment he had afforded an opportunity by looking back, the signaling had commenced. That so much secrecy should be employed seemed to betoken that Santa's case was desperate. That she should have run the risk of tempting him down from London must mean that he possessed some peculiar facility for rendering her a much needed service.

The imminence of the danger, both to her and to himself, was emphasized by this latest precaution. She had not dared to admit him to the house or even to acknowledge his presence, until she had made certain that he, in his turn, was not followed.

This thought, that he might be followed, filled him with an entirely new sensation; it peopled every clump of gorse and bed of bracken with possible unseen enemies. The rustling of the wind, the cry of a sea-bird, made him turn alertly, scanning with suspicion every hollow and mound of the wild, deserted landscape. It seemed unwise to allow his actions to announce his intentions too plainly. What his intentions were he was not very certain. His immediate inclination was to shake himself free from the whole mysterious complication.

Continuing his ramble, he assumed a careless gait, descending the further side of the promontory and bearing always slightly inland, so that his course might lead back eventually to the road from which he had departed. As dusk was gathering, he found himself entering an abandoned military camp. The bare hutments, with their dusty windows and padlocked doors, stretched away in seeming endless avenues of ghostly silence. The Maple Leaf, painted on walls and sign-boards, explained the village boy's reference to Canadian soldiers. He had reached the heart of it, when he was possessed by the overpowering sensation that human eyes were gazing at him. Pulling himself up, he glanced back across his shoulder, crooking his arm to ward off a blow. Realizing what he was doing, he relaxed and stared deliberately about him. Nothing! No sign of life! Yet the certainty remained that human eyes were watching.

“Nerves!” he muttered contemptuously.

It was dark when, leaving the camp, he struck the road. Stars were coming out. Far away along the coast the distant lights of a harbor blinked and twinkled. He hurried his steps. His mind was made up. He would get something to eat in Seafold, discover a garage, hire a car and be back in London by midnight. To confirm his will in this decision, he began making plans for the morrow.

To enter the town he had to pass the house. As its bulk gathered shape, his feet moved more slowly. Long before he came opposite it, he had caught the fragrance of the myrtle in its hedges. The windows which looked his way were shrouded. He paused for a moment outside the rustic gate. He was saying good-by to adventure. He was too old. His season for pardonable folly was ended. The prose of life had claimed him.

Prolonging the pretense of temptation, he pushed open the gate. A hand touched his—a woman's. The desire to play safe faded. Weakly capitulating, he allowed himself to be led up the path and across the shadowy threshold. The door of the darkened house closed behind him. She was slipping the bolts into place.

VIII

He listened. He could not see her face—only the blurred outline of her figure. Except for the sound of her movements, the silence was unbroken. At the end of a passage, leading from the hall, a streak of gold escaped along the carpet.

“Santa!”

No answer.

“Santa, why have you brought me?”

Gliding past him down the passage, she darted into the lighted room, leaving the door ajar behind her. He followed gropingly. As he entered, he was momentarily confused by the sudden change from darkness.

She was addressing him in a small, strained voice. “There's no need to be afraid.”

He looked about him, searching for the inspirer of fear. There was no one save themselves. Then he noticed how she trembled. She was making a brave effort to appear collected, but it was plain that she was wild with terror. Her eyes were wide and dilated. She stood on the defensive, backed against the fireplace, as though she were expecting violence. Her right hand was in advance of her body. It held something which caught the glow of the flames—a nickel-plated revolver, cocked and ready for immediate action. His reception was so different from anything he had anticipated that he stared with an amused expression of inquiry.

At last he asked, “You knew from the start that I thought you were Santa?”

Biting her lip to prevent herself from crying, she nodded. Far from being Santa, she was fair as any Dane, with China-blue eyes and the complexion of a wild rose. He noted the little wisps of curls which made a haze of gold about her forehead. She wore turquoise earrings. They were her only adornment. She herself was a decoration. She was like a statue of the finest porcelain, so flawless that she seemed unreal. Had it not been for her widow's mourning, he would have said that she was untouched by passionate experience. She had an appearance of provoking innocence, which made the paleness of her beauty ardent as a flame.

Speaking quietly, “I'm not easily frightened,” he said; “and you, while you keep me covered with that revolver, have no reason to be afraid. Any moment you choose you can kill me—you've only to press the trigger.”

Tears of horror sprang into her eyes. “But I don't want to kill you.”

“Then why don't you lay it aside?”

“Because—” She gazed at him appealingly.

“Because I'm alone. I may need it to protect myself.”

“From me? No. I should think you can see that.” Was the house really empty? He listened. It was possible that some one might steal up from behind. He did not dare to turn. His only chance of preventing her from shooting him was to keep her engaged in conversation.

“If you feel this way, why did you go to such elaborate pains to force me to visit you to-night? You must have known that I didn't want to come. It isn't I who have intruded.” He smiled cheerfully. “At the risk of appearing rude, I'll be frank with you. When you crossed my path at the Ritz, I was on the point of keeping a most important engagement. When I followed you out of the hotel, it was because of a message I'd found pinned to my pillow, 'Follow the widow.' So it wasn't you in particular that I was following; I'd have followed any widow. I expected that you'd speak to me as soon as we were in the street. I'd no intention of giving up my appointment. You didn't; you led me on, further and further, a step at a time. I don't mind telling you that when I found myself in the train, I was extremely annoyed. By the time I'd arrived at Lewes, I'd fully made up my mind to abandon the chase. Then you spoke to me. I'd wasted so much of my afternoon that I didn't like being beaten. You'd roused my curiosity. Here in Seafold, you dodged me and left me standing in the road like a dummy. That used up the fag-end of my patience; I was mad clean through. I didn't care if I never saw you again. When you signaled me on the headland, I signaled back that I was coming. I wasn't. I was tired of being led on and eluded. When you caught me at the gate, I was flirting with temptation, but I'd already laid my plans to be back in London by midnight. So you see you can scarcely blame me for being here. The shoe's on the other foot entirely. You've put me to great inconvenience merely to tell me, it would seem, that you don't want to shoot me.”

“I don't.”

“Then why not throw the thing away? You're far more scared of it than I am.”

“Because I may have to use it.”

“On whom?”

“You.”

“Why?”

A sweet, slow smile turned up the edges of her mouth. “My orders were to keep you here, if once I'd managed to persuade you inside.”

He laughed outright. “You hate having me here, and you'd hate to see me go. Isn't that the way the land lies? I'm more or less in the same fix: I didn't want to come, and I don't want to stay. The fact remains that we're both here. Why not make the best of it? If you'll stop brandishing that weapon, I'll feel much more comfortable. I'm not trying to escape.”

“You might.”

For the first time he dared to shift his position. “Don't be alarmed,” he warned her. “That's easier. I was stiff. Now, if you'll listen, I've a proposal to make. You're treating me like a burglar, which isn't fair. You may know, but I've not the least idea how long you intend to hold me prisoner. I guess you're waiting for some one else to arrive, but that's neither here nor there. Before the third person comes, you may have shot me—of course, by accident. Revolvers go off if you keep them too long pointed. You know nothing about firearms, and I'm beginning to be rather fond of life. Here's what I propose: if you'll put it away, I'll give you my parole not to come within two yards of you or to attempt to escape. If I want my parole back, you shall have a full five minutes' notice.”

“If I thought that I could trust you—”

“You can. Is it a bargain?”

Without answering, placing her weapon on the mantelpiece, she turned her back on him. She seemed waiting to hear him advance further into the room. He did not stir.

“What is it, Mr. Hindwood?”

“It's that I've just remembered one thing for which our armistice has not provided. You'd better pick up your gun again. It's that I haven't dined. I wonder whether you'd let me into the village—” He left his sentence unended. He suddenly perceived that she was shaken with sobbing. In his concern, he forgot his compact as to distance and hurried over to her side. She swung round, her face blinded with tears. As she stumbled past him, she muttered: “You've beaten me. You're not afraid. I couldn't shoot you now if I wanted.”

IX

Tiptoeing to the threshold, he turned the handle and peeped into the passage. As before, everything was in darkness.

He was free to go. There was nothing to stop him—nothing except his honor. It was easy to argue that even his honor did not prevent him. He had canceled his parole when he had reopened negotiations by telling her to pick up her revolver. She had left it behind her on the mantel-shelf. He took it in his hand and examined it. It was a repeater. Every chamber was loaded. He whistled softly—so she had meant business! Setting the hammer at half-cock, he slipped the weapon in his pocket. He was master of the situation now.

Why didn't he go? Two hours of steady driving, three at the most, and he could be in London. He reminded himself that at this very moment his private papers might be in the process of being ransacked. What if they were? The possibility left him utterly indifferent. He couldn't save them after the lapse of another three hours.

No, the truth was that since his voyage on the Ryndam all the emphases of his life were becoming altered. The importance of money and power no longer seemed paramount. After nearly forty years of living, he had awakened to the fact that it was women who shed a radiance of glamour in an otherwise gloomy world. Of all human adventures they were the most enthralling and the least certain of rewarding.

It was curiosity that had enticed him into his present entanglements; his curiosity had yet to be satisfied. With a revolver in his pocket, he felt that he now possessed the means of extracting the right answers to his questions. He had suffered mild inconveniences, but so far he hadn't done so badly. He had established mysterious relations with two beautiful women. One of them was already under the same roof; the other, he believed, was momentarily expected. He began to figure himself as a poet, a dreamer, a potential storm-center of romance.

“And all because she has blue eyes!” he hinted.

Then he remembered that Santa's eyes were gray, and that up to the last half-hour it had been Santa whom he had supposed that he was following.

He gazed about him, making an inspection of the room, trying to guess at the characters of its inhabitants. It was square and small. Its walls were lined ceiling-high with shelves overloaded with books of a learned appearance. A work-basket stood on a mahogany desk with mending, scissors, and reels of cotton strewn near it. A piano had been crushed into a corner, looking flippantly out of place amid these scholarly surroundings. Below the mantelshelf was a rack containing a row of pipes. Set about wherever a space allowed were vases of freshly cut flowers.

The contradictions of the room suggested that it had once been a man's den, but had now been taken over by a woman. This seemed to indicate that the owner of the house was actually a widow.

Almost the whole of the wall confronting the door was occupied by a tall French window, which opened directly on a lawn. Shrubs grew waist-high about it. Instinct told him that this was the likeliest approach for the other person, by whose order his kidnaping had been plotted. He felt convinced that this person would prove to be a woman, but he was taking no chances. With the night behind her, she could spy on him for hours without being detected. She might be spying on him now.

Assuming a listless manner, he seated himself to one side of the fireplace. Out of the tail of his eye, without seeming to do so, he watched the shadowy panes. His right hand was thrust into his pocket, gripping the revolver.

After the lapse of some minutes, he heard in the passage the widow's returning footsteps. Outside the door she halted, fumbling at the handle. Giving up the attempt, she called to him to open. Just as he was rising, a face, tense with eagerness, lifted itself out of the bushes, peering in on him.

CHAPTER THE FOURTH—HE BECOMES PART OF THE GAME

I

THE face hung there against the darkness for a second; then the leaves closed over it as it was stealthily withdrawn. In the utterness of his astonishment, Hindwood all but gave himself away. It was not the face he had expected.

Masking his excitement with a yawn, he turned his back on the window and stepped toward the door, opening it sufficiently to thrust his head into the passage, but not wide enough to permit the watcher in the bushes to learn anything of the person with whom he talked. He found his captress standing just beyond the threshold, carrying a tray, which accounted for her awkwardness.

“You won't have to dine in the village,” she explained. Then, catching his strange expression, “What has happened?”

“Some one was to come to-night,” he whispered: “the person who gave orders for my kidnaping. Isn't that so? She was to enter through the window from the lawn, while you held me prisoner at the revolver's point.”

“Is she here?”

“No, but a man who is her enemy—a Major Cleasby. He's hiding directly in her path. He supposed you were she when you tried the door. He showed his face. Is there any way in which we can warn her?”

The widow set down her tray. Her eyes met his searchingly. “If the man were there, you wouldn't want to save her.”

“Why not? You think I've invented the man in the bushes in order that Santa may be scared away? I'm no more afraid of Santa than I was of you. Besides, in your absence I've stolen your revolver. Ah, that convinces you! The man's her husband and a secret service agent. I can feel his eyes in my back. If you don't warn her, she'll be caught. There must have been some prearranged signal. What was it?”

Instead of answering, she pressed nearer, glancing fearfully across her shoulder into the unlighted hall. Her voice came so faintly that he could only just hear her.

“She wouldn't spare us. Why should you and I—? You don't know what she intended.”

He smiled grimly. “I can guess. I was to have been her scapegoat for the Rogovich murder. She was staging a new version of what happened in the woods of Vincennes. Whether she escaped or was brought to trial, I was to have been arrested. By that time she would have clothed me with the appearance of her guilt. I was to have figured as her lover and the Prince's rival. The motive for my crime was to have been jealousy. The old story—an innocent man dying in her stead!”

“If you think you know that, why should you, unless you are her lover?”

“Because she's a woman.”

Her hands seized his, coaxing him from the doorway into the darkened passage. “For the love of God, go!” she implored. “I give you back your parole.”

Drawing her to him, he held her fast. “Don't struggle. He might hear you. You decoyed me. You trapped me. Why this change? What makes you so concerned for my safety?”

“I didn't know,” she panted, “the kind of man you are.”

“What kind?”

Her heart beat wildly. She lay against him unstirring, her face averted. The moment he released her, she burst forth into new pleading.

“For my sake. I beg of you.”

Into the grimness of his smiling there stole a gleam of tenderness. “And leave you? I guess not. What's the signal?”

“The piano.”

“Come, then,” he said, “you shall play for me. While you play, if we mask our expressions, we can talk of what we choose. Outwardly, to deceive the man in the bushes, we must act a part. I'm an old friend. I've dropped in unexpectedly. You've provided me with supper. While I eat, we chatter and laugh. You sit at the piano and sing for me occasionally. When the hour for Santa's arrival is past, I take my leave. If you're brave, we can carry the farce through. Are you game?”

For answer she picked up the tray and stepped into the room, smiling back at him as he followed.

“I'm your humble servant, as always, Mr. Hind-wood, but I have only two hands and they're occupied. If you'll bring up that table—yes, set it before the fire. That's right. You must be comfortable, if I'm to sing for you.”

II

She won't come now.”

The words reached him in a sigh. The pale hands fluttered from the keyboard. The fair head dropped. Almost instantly she straightened herself, banishing her appearance of weariness. “Don't think that I'm showing the white feather. It's only that I'm exhausted. She won't come now. I'm sure of it.” Then, bending forward with a nervous tremor, “I daren't look round. Has he gone?”

Hindwood pushed back his chair from before the hearth. For the moment he did not answer. He was striving to restore the spell which the intrusion of her fear had broken. Glancing at her sideways, he regarded her quietly where she sat at the piano in her widow's garb. Through the window at her back he caught a glimpse of the garden, shadowy and patched with moonlight. Above the silence he heard the rumble of waves, sifting the pebbles on the shore. Who was she, this woman who possessed the magic to enchant him? Who had been her husband? What kind of man? Had she loved him? How long since he had died? There were so many questions.

She had persuaded him into following her, well knowing that he believed her to be Santa. She had met his discovery of her impersonation with a threat. When the luck was all in her favor, with the panic of a stricken conscience she had thrown in her hand. For the past two hours, in this cozy room, she had surrounded him with shy intimacies of affection, to the end that the unseen spectator, listening outside the panes, might be beguiled. Apparently the deception had succeeded; the spectator had given no sign. It had succeeded too well for Hindwood. It had roused in him the longing that, behind her pretense of friendship, there might lurk a genuine emotion of liking. He had tried to forget that the scene was stage-set. He had wanted to believe that it was real.

“Has he gone?”

There was a break in her voice.

He pulled himself together. “Do you wish me to make certain?”

Rising, he lounged over to the piano as though to select a sheet from the pile of music. In a flash he turned, wrenching wide the doors of the French-window, and was across the step in a bound. Nothing rose from the shadows to disturb the peace of the night. Stooping by the bushes, he made a hurried examination.

“Come,” he called. Then, seeing how she pressed her hands against her mouth, “There's no need to fear.”

When she was standing by his side, he explained: “To-morrow you might think that I'd tricked you. I want you to see for yourself. Here's where he was hiding when he peered in on me. The ground's trampled. The bushes are bent back.”

“He may be still here,” she whispered, “in the garden—somewhere.”

Hindwood smiled reassuringly into her upturned face. “He wouldn't do you any harm if he were. Remember he's a secret service agent. As a matter of fact, he ought to make you feel safe.”

“Safe!” She knotted her hands against her breast. “Shall I ever feel safe? Oh, if I could confess—to you, to any one!”

“If it would help——”

Without giving him a chance to finish his sentence, she plucked at his sleeve with the eagerness of a child. “Would you?”

“What?”

“Let me?”

III

They had reentered the room, fastening the window securely behind them. When that was done, they had drawn the curtains across the panes. She had flung herself into a chair beside the fire and was waiting impatiently for him to join her. But he hovered in the center of the room, fingering his watch and looking troubled.

“What's delaying you?” she asked without turning.

He slipped his watch into his pocket. “I had no idea it was so late.”

“Does that matter? Till morning there are no trains.”

“I was thinking of hotels.”

“They'll be shut.”

“Precisely. So what am I——?”

“Stay with me,” she said lazily.

The room became profoundly silent. The darkened house seemed to listen. Had he plumbed a new depth in this drama of betrayal at the moment when he hoped he had discovered loyalty? He had been deceived by women before. Had he not allowed Santa to deceive him, he would not have been here. He might tell himself that this woman was different. If a man did not tell himself that each new woman was different, the mischief of love would end.

He caught sight of her flaxen head and became ashamed of his reflections. It wasn't possible, if the soul was foul, that the flesh should be so fair. She had the wonder of the dawn in her eyes. Nothing that she had said or done could belie the frankness of her innocence. Standing behind her chair, he gazed down in puzzlement at her graciousness.

“There are conventions. We may have met unconventionally, but neither of us can afford to ignore them.”

Without looking up, she answered, “If you were as alone as I am, you could afford to ignore anything.”

“Perhaps I am.”

“Then you understand.”

“I think I understand.” He spoke gently. “I suppose no man can ever be so lonely as a woman, especially as a woman who has lost her happiness, but I, too, have been lonely. Everybody has. The cowardice which comes of loneliness is responsible for nearly every wickedness. Most thefts, and cheatings, and even murders are committed in an effort to gain companionship. But you can't elude loneliness by short-cuts. Wherever you go, it's with you from birth to death. Brave people make it their friend. Cowards let it become their tempter. Loneliness is no excuse for wrong-doing, nor even for surrendering to the appearance of it.”

“Preaching?”

“No. Trying to share with you my experience. Until this afternoon, you didn't know that I existed. All your life up to the last five minutes, you've been able to do without me. Don't be greedy and spoil everything before it's started. There's tomorrow.”

“Why wait for to-morrow when I trust you now?”

He stooped lower. She had become irresistibly dear. In a rush he had found the clue to her character—her childishness. She couldn't bear to postpone the things she wanted.

“Trust me! I wonder! You're the first woman to have the daring to tell me. I'm not sure that I feel complimented; at this hour of night one has to be a little cold to be trusted like that. But I trust you—which is strange after all that's happened. The person I distrust is myself. You're beautiful. The most beautiful——”

“Am I more beautiful than Santa?”

He caught the vision of her blue eyes glinting up at him. There was nothing roguish in their expression. They were pathetic in their earnestness. Her throat was stretched back, white and firm. Her lips were vivid and parted. Her question sounded like the ruse of a coquette, yet she seemed wholly unaware of her attraction.

He drew himself erect, staring at the wall that he might forbid himself the danger of looking at her. His voice came harsh and abrupt. “Your confession can keep till morning. One can say and unsay anything. It's deeds that can never be unsaid.”

He had reached the door. She spoke dully. “You despise me.” And then, “All my life I've waited for to-morrows. Go quickly.”

Glancing across his shoulder he saw her, a mist of gold in a great emptiness. Slowly he turned back.

“Can't you guess the reason for my going? I reverence you too much.”

Clutching at his hands, she dragged herself to her feet. “It's friendship that I'm asking. What's the use of reverence? Like me a little. You'd do more for Santa. Only to like me wouldn't cost you much.”

IV

I should have died if you'd left me.” He was feeling both amused and annoyed at his surrender; at the same time he was on the alert for developments. She had extinguished the lamps. The sole illumination was the firelight. For what reason she had done it, whether as an aid to confession or as a discouragement to watchers, she allowed him to guess. Whatever the reason, the precaution was wise, but it increased the atmosphere of liaison. He had pushed back his chair to the extreme corner of the hearth, so that he was scarcely discernible. She sat where the glow from the coals beat up into her face. He saw her profile against a background of darkness.

“Died!” He pursed his lips in masculine omniscience. “You'd have gone to your bed and had a good night's rest.”

“I shouldn't. I was in terror. I used to be afraid only by night; now it's both day and night. You're never afraid. You weren't afraid even when I——. How do you manage it?”

“By doing things, instead of thinking about the things that can be done to me. I've learned that what we fear never happens—fear's a waste of time. Fear's imagination playing tricks by pouncing out of cupboards. It's the idiot of the intellect, gibbering in the attic after nightfall. IPs a coward, spreading cowardice with false alarms. It's a liar and a libeller; life's a thousand times kinder than fear would have us paint it.”

She sighed happily. “It was kind to me to-night.” He waited for her confession to commence. She leaned back, her eyes half shut, watching the red landscape in the dancing flames. Time moved gently. Night seemed eternal. Her contentment proved contagious. Neither of them spoke. Nothing mattered save the comfort of her presence. In a hollow of the coals he invented a dream cottage to which he would take her. It had a scarlet wood behind it and mountains with ruby-tinted caves. As the fire settled, the mirage faded.

“Does it strike you as comic,” he questioned, “that you and I should sit here after midnight and that I shouldn't even know what to call you?”

“Varensky. Anna Varensky.”

“Russian?”

She nodded.

“But are you Russian?”

“I'm Ivan Varensky's wife.”

“You say it proudly, as though I ought to know who Ivan Varensky was.”

She turned her head slowly, wondering at him. “There's only one Ivan Varensky: the man who wanted to be like Christ.”

Hindwood jerked himself into wakefulness. “I'm afraid I need enlightenment. I don't——”

“You do,” she contradicted patiently, “or rather, you will when I've helped you to recall him. How hurt he would be, poor Ivan, that a man of your standing should so soon have forgotten him! He hoped to make such a noise in the world. After Czardom had fallen, he aimed to be a savior, healing men with words. But he wanted to be crucified at once. He cared more for Calvary than for the road that led up to it. He was an emotionalist, impatient of Gethsemane; it was the crown of thorns that he coveted. Having only words with which to save humanity, he dashed all over Russia in special trains, speechifying at every halting-place, foretelling his approaching end. He had no time to waste; he believed his days were numbered. His message was always the same, whether he was addressing the Duma, armies marching into action, or a handful of peasants: he was about to die for Russia. Then suddenly Trotzky and Lenine came. They were men who did things; they overthrew his government. Worse, still, they refused to fulfill his prophecies; instead of executing him, they bundled him into exile. To be forced to live, when he had pledged himself to die, was a more cruel crucifixion than any he had anticipated. He found himself nailed to the cross of ridicule with no one to applaud his sacrifice. He was left with nothing to talk about, for the thing he had talked about had not happened. He was an idealist, an inspirer, a prophet, but because death had avoided him, there was no gospel to write. Having climbed the long road to Calvary, he had the tragedy to survive. Don't think I'm belittling him. I loved him. It was a proud, but not an easy task to be the wife of a man who wanted to be like Christ.”

She collapsed into silence, sitting lost in thought, her arms hanging limply by her sides. He wondered what pictures she was seeing in the fire—armed men marching, revolution, palaces going up in dame.

Of course he remembered the Varensky she had described—the Varensky who, in the darkest hour of the war, had hurled himself like a knight-errant to the rescue of the Allies. It was he who was to have consolidated Russia, leading its millions in an endless tide to the defeat of the enemies of righteousness. It was freedom he had promised; freedom to everybody. He had preached that every man was good in himself, that the things that made men bad were laws. Therefore he had swept all laws aside. He had done away with compulsion, repealed death penalties, thrown prisons wide. For a day and night he had held the stage, a shining figure, adored by despairing eyes. Then the slaves whom he had released from restraints had surged over him. He had vanished, trampled beneath ungrateful feet, and Russia had become a mob.

So this was Varensky's wife! He felt awed. The romantic heroism of her husband's failure clothed her with a wistful sacredness. Three years ago he could not have approached her. He would scarcely have dared to have regarded her as a woman. The hysteria of the moment had canonized her. Streets through which she drove in Petrograd had been lined with kneeling throngs. There had been something medieval in the spontaneity of her worship. It had been rumored that she was a bride immaculate; that her purity was the secret of her husband's strength. Her face made the story credible. It had the virgin innocence of a saint's. And here he was allowed to sit beside her, with three years gone, sharing her hearth in this obscure place of hiding!

“You were a Russian Joan of Arc,” he declared enthusiastically. “How well I remember all the legends one read about you. And Varensky—— It doesn't matter that he failed; his was the most gallant figure of the entire war. When every nation was embittered, he set us an example of how not to hate. He refused to kill, when all of us were slaying. He had the courage of meekness; in that at least he followed Christ. What became of him? There was a report——”

“There have been many reports,” she interrupted sadly. “Lest the latest be true, I wear mourning. I wear mourning for him always. Before his fall I was his perpetual bride; since his fall I am his perpetual widow. He wishes to be dead, so to please him——-”

“Then he's still alive?” Immediately he was conscious of the indecency of his disappointment.

She gazed into the darkness with a mild surprise. “I do not know. I never know. That's the torture of it. He was always less a man than a spirit. I begin to think he can not die.”

“You want him——?”

If she had heard his uncompleted question, she ignored it. With folded hands she stared into the red heart of the fire. Behind her, across the walls and ceiling as flames leaped and flickered, shadows took fantastic shapes. When she spoke, as though she were talking to herself, her words came softly.

“He was such a child—so dear, so vain, so intense, so sensitive. Why did he marry me, if it was only to resign me? He treated me as he treated Russia. We were both waiting for him to take us in his arms. But it was always ideals—things one can't embrace—that drew out his affections. Had he loved humanity less and individuals more, he could have gone so far. There was something monstrous about his self-abnegations. Perhaps he denied himself the things for which he did not care. He wanted to seem nobler than any one else. Through egotism he missed his chance. Had he planned to live, he could have killed his enemies and prevented revolution. There was a time when he could have crushed both Lenine and Trotzky. But he had to be too noble. 'No,' he said, 'if their ideal is more right than mine, it will conquer. Truth can not be silenced by slaughter.' It was his inhuman magnanimity that defeated him. So Lenine and Trotzky grew strong and crushed him. Because he had planned to die, millions are starving, and Russia is in chaos.”

“But he doesn't own it?”

“In his heart—yes. Like a General who has blundered, the vision of lost battlefields is forever in his eyes—the forests of white crosses! His egotism is gone. He wants to make atonement; to perish seems the only way. Any one who would delay him, even though she were a woman who loved him, is his enemy. In his remorse he hounds death as other men avoid it. He's head of the counterrevolution and goes continually into Russia for the overthrow of Bolshevism. Not that he hopes for success, but that he may be put against a wall and shot.”

“And always he returns?”

“Always until this last time.”

Her voice sank away in a whisper. He eyed her with misgiving. What was it she desired?

“I read something of this. He's been missing for a long time?”

“A long time.”

Coming out of the shadows, so that she could see his face, he drew his chair close to hers.

“And what has this to do with your confession?”

V

She flinched, as though he had made a motion to strike her. “My confession! Ah, yes! I forgot.” She tried to smile. Stretching out her hand, she touched him in a timid appeal for understanding. Taking it between his own he held it fast.

“Like that,” he said, “as though it were a bird that's tired. It isn't its own nest, but it's safe and warm; let it rest till it grows stronger.”

“You're good,” she faltered. “Most good men are hard.”

“Maybe,” he laughed. “But I'm not good. On the other hand, I don't suppose I'm bad. I'm simply a man who's always had to fight, so I know what it's like to be up against it. You're up against it at present. You can see nothing before you but a high stone wall with no way round it. I've been there, and I've found that when you can't get round a wall, there's usually a door. What do you say? Shall we look for a door together?”

“I have.” She sank her head. “Every day and night in three interminable years I've looked for it. I'm like a person lost in a fog, standing still, listening, running, falling.”

“Scared to death?”

She nodded.

“Then don't be scared; stop running. Wait for your fear to catch up with you. If you face it, it'll shrink to nothing. The feet of a pursuer are like an army. What's causing your panic? Varensky? The thought that he may not return?”

“No.”

“That he may?”

“No.”

“Then?”

“That he may go on wasting me forever.”

She waited for him to say something. When he remained silent, she bent forward staring vacantly into the hearth. “Perhaps I'm a coward and unfaithful. Perhaps if he'd been successful—— I know what he thinks of me: that I'm a fair-weather wife. But I'm not. If it would help him, I'd give my life for him. He doesn't want my life. He doesn't want my body. He wants the one thing that I can't give him—that I should believe in him. There are people who still believe in him—the Little Grandmother. There are others, like Prince Rogovich, who pretended to believe in him that he might use him as a cat's-paw. He says good-by to me for the last time and vanishes. I wait in retirement for news of his execution. At the end of two months, three months, half a year, he comes back. Then the rehearsing for his martyrdom commences all afresh. If there were anything I could do! But to be wasted for no purpose!”

She turned her head wearily, glancing at him sideways. “You called me the Joan of Russia. I was almost. There was a time when not to be loved and not to be a mother seemed a small price to pay for sainthood. It was my happiness against the happiness of millions. But now——” Her eyes filmed over.

“But now———?” he prompted.

She brushed her tears away with pitiful defiance. “I want to be a woman—to be everything in some man's life.”

“Perhaps you are in his, but he doesn't show it.”

She seemed to listen for laughter. Then, “No,” she said. “When I try to be a woman, I play Satan to him.”

“And that's the wall?”

“Not all of it. There's Santa.”

In the swift march of his emotions he had almost forgotten Santa. As though she had been drowning and he had turned back from rescuing her, the mention of her name stung him with reproach.

“What of Santa?” he asked in a low voice.

VI

She's in love with my husband.”

He let go her hand. “Do you mind if I smoke? Perhaps you'll join me? No?”

He took his time while he lit his cigarette. Then, speaking slowly, “I can't believe all the evil that I've heard about this woman. And yet I ought. Every fresh person has told me something increasingly vile. To make a case against her, I have only to take all the trouble she's caused me. I meet her on a liner and part with her on landing; from that moment I have no peace. I'm pestered by strangers accusing and defending her. My room is entered by spies. I find an anonymous note pinned to my pillow. I'm lured out of London into the heart of the country on the pretext that she's in danger and I can help her. You know the rest. Until the happenings of tonight, the most probable explanation seemed to be that she had taken a secret fancy to me and had turned to me in her distress, when she found herself suspected of a crime. That theory won't hold water any longer.”

“It might.”

“It couldn't. You tell me she's in love with your husband.”

“Santa can be in love with as many men as serve her purpose. The only loyalty to which she's constant is the memory of her dead child.”

He shook himself irritably. “Nothing that you' or any one has told me explains her. She left on me an impression of nobility which absolutely contradicts all this later information. Until I met you, it almost seemed there was a conspiracy on foot to poison my mind. What she is said to have done may all be true, but I can't help searching behind her actions for a higher motive. You'd clear matters up if you'd tell me frankly how it is that you come into the picture.”

“The picture!” She shrank back from him like a timid child.

Controlling himself, he spoke patiently. “Do I need to be explicit? You ought to hate her. She's in love with your husband. When, a few hours ago, it was a case of warning her of the trap she was walking into, you were reluctant to give the signal. 'She wouldn't spare us,' you said; 'so why should you and I——?' And yet you're her accomplice. It was you whom I followed. It was you who, when you'd got me into this room, tried to hold me at the revolver's point.”

She buried her face in the hollow of her arm. Her voice came muffled. “It was I.”

He waited for her to say more. She made no sound—not even of sobbing.

“It was a dangerous game to play,” he reminded her. “You didn't know your man or how he would take it. You must have had some strong motive. You might have killed me without even intending. What a risk you ran, doing a thing like that singlehanded! For a moment, when I first entered, everything was touch and go.”

And still she made no reply.

The fire had burned low. He emptied coals on it. To bridge the embarrassment of her silence, he went over to the window, pulling aside the curtains, and stood gazing out at the glory of the night. The moon rode high. Trees were clumped and motionless. The crooning of waves made a continual lullaby.

She was married, and she was wasted. She was not wanted, and she was not released. She had a husband who refused to live and could not contrive to die. As a substitute for passion she had tried sainthood; it had not satisfied.

He let the curtains fall. Turning, he gazed back at the black-garbed figure bowed in the half-circle of firelight. Her golden hair had broken loose. It poured across her shoulders and gathered at her feet in a pool. At the moment she looked more a Magdalene than a saint. And this was the woman who had made men brave by her purity—to whom a nation had turned in its agony!

A flood of pity swept over him. Poor, narrow shoulders to have borne such a burden! Poor, virgin feet to have come so long a journey! Poor, mortal hands to have given such a blessing! She had been robbed and cast aside.

The cruelty of idealists! She was their victim. What did they attain? Idealists slew happiness on the altar of dreams that a future happiness might result from it. Though their dreams were mistaken, they lost nothing; they snatched their sensation of godlike righteousness. But who could restore the happiness of others which their frenzy had destroyed?

If this time Varensky had had the decency to die, she was free. He himself could take her. But would she want him? He had no attractions. All that he could offer would be to serve her. He couldn't place her back on her pinnacle of fame. Instead of crowds, he would be her only worshiper. Would that satisfy a woman who had been a saint for a day? He could promise her rest and protection. He could take her feet in his hands and guide them over rough places. And if she wanted to be a woman——

Crossing the room on tiptoe, he stood over her. Sinking to his knee, he placed a hand on her shoulder.

“Won't you look up? I'm not here to hurt you. I wouldn't even judge you. Life's been hard.”

When she gave no sign, he spoke again.

“I'm a man and a stranger. You're a wife. But you've told me so much. You're wounded. You can't go on by yourself.”

She moved. He knew now that she was listening.

“There's that door in the wall we were going to find. Perhaps we've found it. Let me be your friend. It would be foolish and wrong for me to tell you that I——”

She raised her head. Her hair fell back, and her eyes gazed out at him with hungry intensity. “Don't say it,” she implored. “Varensky——”

“But if he's dead? If I can bring you sure proof?”

For answer she pressed his hand against her bosom.

VII

He seated himself at her feet, his arms clasped about his knees as if crouched before a camp-fire. How much meaning had she read into his implied confession? He felt happy; happier than ever before in his life, and yet, if she were the cause of his happiness, the odds were all against him. She had promised him nothing. She could promise him nothing. All he knew of her was what she had told him. His elation might prove to be no more than an emotion that would fade in the chill light of morning.

“It would be foolish and wrong for me to tell you——” The words had risen to his lips unpremeditated. He had not realized that he cared for her until they were uttered. He had merely felt an immense compassion, an overwhelming desire to comfort her. That he should care for her at all was preposterous. It was paying her no compliment. Love that was worth the having required a more permanent incentive than physical beauty. Her mind and her character were a riddle to him. If his passion was no passing mood and she were indeed a widow, it would be her mind and her character that he might one day marry. He ought to have foreseen that something of this sort would be sure to happen between a man and woman left alone after midnight.

But the triumphant self whom she had roused in him grinned impudently at this cautious moralizing. He gloried in the magnificent unwisdom of his indiscretion. He was surprised and delighted at this newly-discovered capacity for recklessness. When experience was growing stale, he had broken through limitations and found himself gazing on an unguessed landscape where adventure commenced afresh. He could still feel the softness of her flesh against his hand. That sudden act of tenderness had altered all their relations.

He glanced up at her shyly. She, too, was dreaming. Her lips were smiling uncertainly; there was a far-away, brooding expression in her eyes. The blackness of her mourning merged with the shadows, making her seem disembodied; all he could see distinctly was the golden torrent of her hair framing the pallor of her face.

“They knelt to you in Petrograd. I don't wonder.”

“Poor people! It did them no good. I never want any one else to do it.”

“But I kneel to you. I crouch at your feet.”

“I would rather be loved than worshiped.” She restrained him gently. “Not yet.”

“Then, until I may love, I kneel to you.”

“You ought to find me repellent. No, let me speak. I own to you that I'm married, and here I sit with you alone, not knowing whether my husband lives or is buried. I must be wicked—more wicked than I guessed. Ivan was right; he used to tell me I played Satan to him. These hands, which look so soft and white, are cruel. This face, which seems so gentle, is a lie. This hair, which makes a pillow for your head, is a snare. One good man has already cast me aside. Rather than love me, he preferred death. And you are good. How near I came to killing you!” She bent over him, taking his face between her hands. “You! Do you understand?” She had drawn his head back against her knees. Her lips all but touched him. He could feel the fanning of her breath. Her voice came pantingly, as though she dreaded her own question: “What can you see in me?”

“Blue eyes, like a glimpse of heaven.”

“Tell me truly.”

“What can I see?” He stared up adoringly. “A woman who's still a child. A woman who's been cheated. A woman whose arms are empty. A woman who sits outside a tomb, dreaming of life.”

“Not of life,” she corrected softly; “of being allowed to live for a man.”

“For me, perhaps?”

She smiled vaguely.

“Without knowing what kind of a man I am?”

“Do you know me?” She sat upright, gazing straight before her. “You don't even know why I brought you.”

“Why?”

“It seems strange to tell you now. It seems like a forgotten sadness, so forgotten that it might belong to some one else. And yet once it hurt. I brought you that I might win back my husband. Don't stiffen. Look up and see how I'm smiling. I was never his in your sense. I was an image in a niche, whose hands he kissed. I was a mascot, bringing him good luck. The woman part of me he postponed superstitiously till his cause should be won. It will never be won now.”

“But he warned you before he married you?”

She shook her head. “He made sure of me. At first I was proud to be included in his sacrifice. Then failure made it all absurd. I was sorry for him. I knew only one way to comfort him. But because he had failed, he became the more determined to deny himself. Instead of comforting him, I became his tempter. Then Santa——”

Hindwood pulled himself together and bent forward, glowering into the fire. “I can't understand all this talk of sacrifice. It sounds so confoundedly unpractical. As far as I can make out, your husband's idea of virtue was to abstain from everything that makes life worth living. He didn't profit any one by abstaining. All he did was to narrow himself. If he'd wanted to be an ascetic, why couldn't he have done the thing thoroughly and played the game? There was no need to drag you into it.”

“There was no need,” she assented quietly, “but to have me and to withstand me made him appear more dedicated. He tantalized himself with the thought of me and used me as a knife with which to gash himself. I was a part of the road to Calvary he was treading in order that Russia might be saved. It gratified his pride to make the road spectacular. Then, when we were in exile and he was no longer a power, Santa came, the ruthless idealist—his very opposite.”

“Ruthless, perhaps! But I shouldn't call her an idealist.”

“She is—an idealist who, to gain her ends, stoops to any baseness. She's an avenging angel, beautiful and sinister. She's one of the few revolutionaries who knows what she wants; because she knows, she gets it. Varensky never knew. His head was in the clouds. He lost sight of his purpose in a mist of words.”

“What does she want?” As he asked the question, he glanced back at her where she gleamed like a phantom.

“She wants——” There was a pause during which the only sound was the struggle of the distant surf. “She wants to make men pay for what they do to children. All her crimes—— She's a mother, robbed of her young; in her own fierce way, she's taken all the children of the world to her breast.”

“But men don't do anything.”

She caught his tone of puzzlement. “Oh yes. Each generation commits ferocious sins against the coming generation that can't protect itself. It's children who pay for wars and every social injustice. Men live like a marauding army, pillaging the land between birth and death. They pass on and leave to children the settlement of their reckless debts. Take this latest war; five million children in Europe alone are dying of starvation at this moment. Santa's marked down the men who are responsible for their suffering; silently, one by one, she drugs them with her beauty and exacts the penalty.”

“Prince Rogovich?”

“Probably. He was raising funds for a new carnage.”

“But where do I come in? You said that you'd brought me here to help you win your husband.”

“She's in love with Ivan. To be loved by Santa is like witnessing the signature to one's death warrant. Perhaps she's a Bolshevik agent—the only people to whom the Bolsheviks are merciful are children. Perhaps she's really in love with him. She plays with him like a cat with a mouse.”

“And he?”

“He's indifferent, as he is to every woman. Yet because she's treacherous and he wants to die, he takes her with him on many of his journeys. I hoped that if I could give you to her, she might spare him. That was before I knew you. I was beside myself with suspense. Ivan has been gone so long; to do her bidding seemed like giving him his last chance of life. She's in danger and in hiding. You're the one person who can prove her guilt. I thought that if I put you in her power, I'd place her under an obligation, so that——”

“And now?”

She covered her face with her hands. “God forgive me, it's your safety that counts—not Ivan's.” He knelt against her, plucking her hands aside. “Look at me,” he commanded. “So long as your husband lives, his safety comes first. In saving me, you might betray him. If, in snatching our happiness, we connived at his death, his shadow would always stand between us. I'm still your prisoner; I've not taken back my parole. Here's your revolver.” He drew it from his pocket and laid it on her knees. “Fulfill your bargain.”

“How?”

“Take me to Santa.”

“But Ivan—already he may be——”

“Until we know, we'll play the game by him.” When she hesitated, he added, “I wouldn't be friends with any woman who couldn't be loyal.”

Her hands groped after the revolver and found it. Forcing back her tears, she answered, “Nor would I with any man.”

Rising to his feet, he helped her to rise. “Take me to her.”

VIII

As they stepped into the garden, the first restlessness of morning was in the air. The moon had vanished. Stars were going out. Along the low level of sea-line dawn cast a sickly shadow. It was as though night were an indigo curtain behind which silver forms were moving.

She led the way across the lawn, through a door in the wall, and out on the short, crisp turf. She had thrown a cloak about her and pulled the hood over her head. It made her look cowled and elfin. It was the hour when everything is fantastic.

He had an oppressive sense of unreality, as though this were all a dream from which he would shortly rouse. He stood aloof from recent happenings and surveyed his share in them in an elderly, derisive fashion. What were all these promises that he had been exchanging like a gallant? He tried to recall his exact words. To what extent had he committed himself? He had crossed the Atlantic that he might multiply his fortune—for no other reason. He was neither an idealist nor a sentimentalist; he had realized the chance that a bankrupt Europe offered and had come to take advantage of it. What would these derelicts of the catastrophe think of him if they guessed his real purpose? They were willfully, even contemptibly, unpractical; yet their perverted unselfishness troubled his conscience. To spend half one's years in exile, like the Little Grandmother, might not correct injustice, but at least it was a brave protest. To plan to die, like Varensky, because he had failed to rescue humanity, was a counsel of despair, but it had its gleam of nobility. To assassinate, like Santa, men whose statesmanship you did not comprehend was the madness of a zealot, but she at least staked her life against theirs. Into none of these undertakings did profit enter. It was disquieting to find himself among people so determined to convert the world to altruism. The world had been like this always; it would be like this to the end. If they were once to sense who he was, they would regard him as their enemy. He was walking into danger with his eyes wide open. His wisest plan would be to sink into the shadows and take the first train back to sanity. To do that he would have to leave her.

And why not? What did he owe her? What was she to him? She belonged to another man. Waiting for him to die, or to make sure of his death, might prove a tedious business—a humiliating one, most certainly. And yet to leave her now——

She had been going on ahead—or was it his steps that had been lagging? She had halted. As he came up, he felt the firm surface of the road beneath his tread.

In the gloom she laid her hand on his arm. “If you've promised too much——”

That determined him. “I keep my promises,” he answered shortly.

Walking side by side, they struggled on against the mass of all-surrounding vagueness. It seemed like a strong, gray tide pressing on their breasts, against which they made no headway.

What was to be the upshot of it? She was guiding him to Santa. His lips twisted. It would take more than Santa to inspire him with terror. England wasn't the jungle. A man couldn't disappear unnoticed. Supposing in the next half-hour Santa were to do away with him, what would she gain by it? She would have silenced his testimony in the Rogo-vich affair, but she would have added to the evidence. If she were the woman she was painted, she would be too wary to do that. No, she would not attempt to kill him. Then what was her urgency?

Gradually night was fading. The paleness from the sea was spreading. It drove like smoke, in billowy banks of vapor, creeping low along the ground. Live things were waking. In separate, plaintive warnings, early-risen birds were calling. Across the road ahead rabbits scurried. Against the formless vacancy of sky the rounded shoulders of the uplands became discernible. He took notice of their direction. She was leading him to the abandoned camp.

“Madame Varensky.”

She started. “Not that.”

“I'm sorry. It was the only name I knew to call you. What do they usually——?”

“Anna.”

She came close like a child and stood gazing up at him.

He stooped and spoke gently. “You're a wild rose. Once more let me look into your eyes. It's so strange that you should care for me.”

“More strange to me,” she said.

He placed his hands on her shoulders. “There's something that I want you to remember. If harm comes to either of us, believe always that it was only good that I intended.”

“Whatever you brought me would be good,” she murmured.

“I wish it might.” He tumbled the hood back so that he could see her hair. “When a man loves a woman who's already married, it doesn't often bring happiness. It wouldn't be right that it should. It isn't our fault that this has happened, but it will be if we misuse it.”

“We shan't misuse it.”

“There's something else.” He groped after his words. “Before I came to you, I'd been foolish. There's no sense in regretting; if I hadn't been foolish, we shouldn't have met. I thought that I was following Santa; you can guess——”

She inclined her head.

“And there's one thing more. If your husband comes back, promise me you'll forget.”

She strained against him, so their lips were nearly touching. “Never.” She spoke fiercely. And again, “Never. Though it's years and you forget.”

His hands slipped from her shoulders, lower and lower, till his arms closed about her. “Rest,” he whispered, “if it's only for a moment, poor, tired little bird.”

Through the ghostly twilight of the autumn dawn they entered the deserted camp. Before one of the hutments she halted and tapped. She tapped again. There was no answer. Cautiously raising the latch, she peered into the room. Beckoning to him, she slipped across the threshold.

IX

The hut was empty. The floor was deep in dust. The ceiling was meshed with cobwebs. Nailed across the window, just as the soldiers had left it, a dingy curtain hung. Striking a match, he held it above his head. At the far end he made out signs of occupancy. On a shelf was a loaf of bread and near by a pitcher. In a corner, spread on the bare boards for a bed, was a wrap. He stooped; it was Santa's cloak of sables.

The match went out. He turned. “How long has she been here?”

“From the time she knew she was suspected.”

“She knew she was suspected at Plymouth. What made her motor all across England to this?” He glanced round with pity at the poverty-stricken forlornness.

“She wanted to be near.”

“What? It would be better to tell me.”

“To the road out.”

He lit a cigarette and considered. “So there are more people in it,” he said at last, “than just the few that I have met! It's an organization. I might have guessed. There are the people who helped the little old lady to visit me undetected. There are the people who entered my room in my absence. There's the foreign gentleman, who couldn't speak English, who called for Santa in his car. But if this hut is on the road out, why was she delaying?”

“For you, perhaps.”

“But she was risking her freedom every second. Why for me, Anna?”

Before he had given her time to answer, his mind had leaped to a new conjecture. “What if she's captured?”

Suddenly the tragedy of this strange woman, temple-dancer, revolutionary, avenger of children, became vivid. Her pain stung him as though he had suffered it himself. He lived again the hunted hours that must have been hers while she had listened in this dusty room. He remembered her fascination, the grayness of her eyes, the fastidiousness of her dress. What a contrast to these surroundings! How often she must have crouched by that window, watching from behind the shabby curtain for the approach of the pursuer! The men she had killed did not matter. Probably they had deserved their death. His pity was reserved for her. She had been the pampered darling of princes. Her whims had been commands to lovers who themselves were rulers.

No present had been too costly to purchase the ecstasy of her complaisance. Her body had been a jewel, guarded, coveted, irrepeatable in its beauty. Crimes had been committed for its possession. And this was her end! He heard in memory the hoarse pleading of her voice, trying vainly to convince him that love could make her good.

The woman at his side was speaking. “We heard no sound. She was armed. If they'd tried to take her, she'd have defended herself.”

His thoughts came back. “Last night. Yes. If they'd taken her in the garden. But they might have known she would be armed. Perhaps they followed her. If they traced her to this hut, they might have waited till she was sleeping——”

She shook her head. “It isn't that. She's grown tired of delaying. She's gone by the road out.”

He frowned. “That's the second time you've used the phrase. Can't you tell me plainly?”

“If it's not too late, I'll show you.”

She darted out of the hut. When he joined her in the open, she was waiting impatiently to secure the door behind him. The moment it was fastened, she set off at a run. She raced like a boy, with none of a woman's awkwardness. With an occasional backward glance, up the long deserted avenue of the camp she fled. At first he was content to follow for the pleasure he had in watching her. She was so swift and young. She was like a deer in her slenderness. Sudden eagerness had transformed her. The hood had slipped back to her shoulders; the wind of her going fluttered in her hair.

Outside the camp she bore to the left in a direction leading further afield. Over gorse and bracken dew had flung a silver net. The turf was a tapestry sewn with jewels. Larks were springing up. The keen fragrance of seaweed mingled with the honeyed perfumes of the land.

He caught up with her. “Why?” he panted.

She had no breath to waste in words. Turning on him a flushed and laughing face, she pointed ahead.

Just short of the cliff-edge, where the sheer drop began, she sank to her knees, clasping her breast. While she recovered, he gazed about him. He discovered no sign of the thing she was pursuing. The sea was blanketed in mist. Above the blurred horizon, the red eye of the sun stared at him. From the foot of the cliff came the lapping of waves. No other sound.

She had risen. He was about to speak. She pressed a finger to her lips. Taking him by the hand, she led him to the edge.

At first, as he gazed down, he saw only the crumbling face of the chalk. Then he made out a winding path descending; it seemed no broader than a track that a goat might follow.

“What is it?”

“Listen.”

She dragged excitedly on his arm.

Distinctly, above the lapping of waves, he heard the click of oars working in oar-locks. Beneath the fog a vessel was hiding. It had dropped a boat which was pulling toward the land.

“The road out,” she whispered.

“But Santa——”

She nodded. “It's not so difficult as it looks. It was used by smugglers. We use it——”

She broke off. Oars were being shipped. The prow grounded. There was a muttering of men's voices. Some sort of discussion. A pause. Then oars were put out again. The rowing recommenced, growing fainter and fainter.

X

Gone!”

She pressed against him in her gladness.

Seeing the relief in her eyes, he questioned, “What does this mean to you, Anna?”

“Safety.”

“Anything else?”

“Freedom, perhaps.”

“You mean you think that Santa had received word of your husband and that that was why——?”

“I don't want to think or mean; I only want to feel. It's as though I'd been living in a prison and the door had been flung wide. I wasn't one of them. They condemned me. In their hearts they despised me. I was too weak. I couldn't bear their cross.” She clenched her hands against her cheeks till the knuckles showed white. “What's the good of being crucified? It's so much better to live and be glad for people.”

“And Santa,” he asked, “where she's going, what will happen to her?”

She raised her face. “Pain. She'll be hounded and hunted. She's getting too well known. Prince Rogovich thought he recognized her. She'll be always escaping, rushing from hiding to hiding, till one day—— To have been loved so much and to be pushed out of life——”

Behind the mist they heard the creak of ropes running over pulleys. A gasoline engine was started. For an instant the shadow of a trawler loomed through the wall of opaqueness. The tiller was thrust over. She vanished. They stood very silently, listening and watching. In imagination Hindwood followed the vessel's course. It was not of the vessel he was thinking, but of the woman on board her. “To have been loved so much and to be pushed out of life——” If he had had the chance, what could he have done for her? She had fascinated him; but he had not loved her. She was past reclaiming. Love with a woman of her kind would have meant passion—nothing more. A fierce flame, self-consuming! A slow degrading of an emotion that was fine! Yet he was filled with pity and unreasoning remorse. Some day her enemies would overtake her—good, respectable men like Major Cleasby; the good men who by the injustice of their prejudices had made her what she was.

“It's a chapter ended,” he said quietly.

Slipping his arm through hers, as though she already belonged to him, he was turning inland toward the peace of the rolling country, when his step was arrested. He caught the sound of labored breathing and the rattle of sliding chalk. Hands groped above the edge of the cliff, searching for a holding. They were followed by the head and shoulders of a man with a face intensely white, in which a pair of pale green eyes smoldered. Lower down and out of sight a woman spoke. The voice was Santa's.

CHAPTER THE FIFTH—THE GREEN EYES CAST A SPELL

I

HINDWOOD stood rooted to the ground. He had thrust Anna behind him. She was tugging at his hand with the tenacity of terror. He scarcely dared breathe while he watched the green-eyed man dragging himself inch by inch to safety. To go to his assistance might cause his death. Any move that startled him might fling him back over the precipice. In falling he would sweep away the unseen woman who must be clinging to the face of the cliff below him.

To Hindwood it seemed that he was present at a fantastic rehearsal of the Day of Resurrection. When the last trumpet blew, it would probably be precisely in some such fashion that the sea would give up its dead. It would happen about sunrise, when mankind was still abed. It would commence very quietly, when clouds were hanging low and the first of the barnyard cocks were crowing. Without warning, graves would open, and all the tired people, who had been so long resting, would begin to stir. Like the sound of falling rain, they would patter through the drowsing country, searching for their ancient dwellings. At first they would walk alone, then in groups, later in crowds. By the time the living looked out of their windows there would be no standing room on earth. Across seas and oceans the drowned would come swimming. They would wade through waves and clamber up cliffs, just as this man was doing.

The vision became so probable that Hindwood glanced behind him to make sure that it was not happening. In a shimmering expanse of dew and autumn coloring lay the sweet, green landscape of living men, the kindly hedgerows, the sheltering valleys, the friendly villages. Everything was gentle and unaltered. It was only at this barrier, which the green-eyed stranger was struggling to surmount, that the tranquillity ended. At its brink eternity commenced, a pulsating oblivion of mist and grayness across which the rising sun peered curiously.

The stranger was too occupied with his danger to be aware that he was being observed. Clutching at tufts and digging with his fingers, he was easing himself out of the abyss. Little by little he was gaining ground till at last, pulling his knees clear of the edge, he sprawled exhausted on the turf. But it was only for a moment. Twisting about, still lying flat, he reached down to his companion. As she appeared, he retreated, steadying her efforts and dragging her with him. Side by side they collapsed, breathing heavily and staring in dazed defiance at the death they had avoided.

Hindwood made a step to approach them. He found himself tethered. Anna was gazing up at him, silently imploring. Her hair seemed a mass of solid gold, weighing her down. The blue veins in her temples stood out beneath her fairness. Her throat was milk-white and stretched back. Her lips were parted, revealing the coral of her mouth. It was as though she had been caught from behind by an assailant and brutally jerked back. With little endearing motions she caressed Hindwood's hand. He tried to fathom her necessity; in the presence of her weakness there was nothing that he would not have granted.

The man with the green eyes had recovered. In the act of rising he had caught sight of them. His jaw had dropped open. If it was possible, his complexion had gone a shade whiter. His expression bore testimony to the medley of his emotions, the chief of which was astonishment. He made an oddly pathetic figure, with his scratched hands and torn clothing, crouching in that hunted attitude. He had lost his hat in the ascent. His brown hair was lank with perspiration. He was a lean man and graceful as a greyhound. Even in his present ungainly posture there was a hint of something swift and gallant in his bearing. One forgot that he was a vagabond who had eluded formalities and completed an illegal landing; he looked more like a champion unhorsed in a tourney. His brow was wide and noble, but the top of his head was shaped like a deformity and rose into a point like a dunce's cap. His eyes were well-spaced and piercing; they penetrated with a sense of power. His mouth was thin-lipped and sensitive—too sensitive for a man's. His face was narrow and smooth as a girl's. He had a haggard appearance of perpetual suffering, which the extremeness of his pallor served to enhance. He was indefinably tragic. He might have sat equally well for a portrait of Lucifer or of Harlequin overtaken by his folly.

Very wearily he lifted himself from the ground and stumbled toward them. As he did so, Santa uttered a nervous cry and turned—after which she watched broodingly what happened.

Paying no attention to Hindwood, the man made straight for Anna. Bending over her humbly, he whispered unintelligible words. Her terror left her. Making no sound, she raised to him eyes eloquent with compassion.

“What did he say?” Hindwood questioned.

She was prepared to reply, when the stranger stayed her with a gesture. “I was apologizing in Russian for having returned.”

Hindwood glanced at the ragged edge of the cliff and shrugged his shoulders. “An apology's scarcely necessary. You're to be congratulated. You seem to have recognized this lady. Who are you?”

The stranger drew himself erect. A grim smile played about his mouth. “Ivan Varensky, at your service.”

II

Hindwood stared at him with a frown. He was contrasting this Ivan Varensky with the leader of men whose deeds of three years ago had so deeply stirred him. One picture stood out ineffaceably. It was of a sea of panic-stricken soldiers, patriotism forgotten, arms flung away, in wild retreat, and of Ivan Varensky driving forward alone, as though he, by his single courage, could turn back the enemy. And this was the man—the white knight of Russia, the scape-goat, the magician of words! Had he met him three years ago, he would have knelt to him. Now all he could do was to frown.

It was necessary to say something. He spoke gruffly. “You've chosen an odd method of returning. We had news you were dead.”

“I was,” the green eyes narrowed, “nearly. I'm always nearly dying. Isn't that so, Anna? And then I come back. This last time, as you observed, I had the discourtesy to forget. I was thinking of Santa. Actually I struggled to survive. Believe me, that's unlike me.”

The forbearance of his manner was rebuking. Making an effort to be genial, Hindwood held out his hand. “It's a strange way to meet. I've long been your admirer. It was a close call—as close as a man could have.”

Varensky winced as the powerful grip closed about his fingers. They were long and pointed, more like a woman's than a man's. “A close call!” He smiled. “You're American? It wasn't—not for me. I could tell you— But perhaps one day, when I've become past history, Anna will do that.”

As he mentioned his wife, he gave her a look at once tender and furtive—a look which acknowledged without rancor the truth of the situation. She started forward, but his eyes held her. She stopped half-way.

“However you return,” she said chokingly, “and however often, you know that I'm glad. It's the certainty that I shall lose you—that however often you return I shall never have you—”

She bowed her head. From the edge of the cliff, without a trace of emotion, the other woman watched her.

Tilting her face with his bruised fingers, Varensky regarded her earnestly. “As if I wasn't aware of that!” And then, “Let's be going.”

Side by side, but always separate, they moved across the downs. There was no backward glance. Hindwood followed them with his eyes till they sank into a hollow. The last he saw was the raw gold of her hair and the conical top of his pointed head, growing more distant above the bracken.

III

And I, too, have to apologize. I failed to keep my appointment.”

He swung round at the mockingly spoken words, to find that Santa had stolen up behind him. Until now he had had no time to notice her. His anger was so intense that it held him silent. After all that she had done and had intended to do to him, she had the effrontery to jest! Did she think that he was as much her dupe as the fool who had died for her in the woods of Vincennes?

But his anger was short-lived and left him sternly cold. She was changed. Her fastidious elegance was a thing of the past. She was commonly attired as any fisher-girl. Her cheap blouse was rent at the neck; its sleeves were stained and in tatters. Her rough skirt had been nearly trodden off. She was tom and disheveled. She had suffered even more from her adventure than had Varensky. Her hat lay crushed at her feet in the grass. With her wounded hands she “was doing her best to twine the thick coils of her hair into place. She stood confessed for what she was, a fugitive from justice. The wildness of the landscape made a fitting setting. She looked startlingly untamed. She might have passed for a peasant Ophelia, except that her gray eyes were calm and her manner nonchalant.

“There are a good many things, besides missing your appointment, for which you have to apologize.”

“I can explain—”

He cut her short. “Between you and me no explanations are necessary.”

She jerked back her head, flattening her hands against her sides like a soldier standing at attention. “Why not?”

He took his time to answer. “Because you're nothing to me.”

Her face went white, then flamed scarlet, as though he had struck her with his open palm. “Nothing to you!” She spoke slowly. “I, Santa Gorlof, am nothing to you! You're the first man to whom I ever offered my heart. I would lie down in the mud that you might walk over me. I'd let you beat me like a dog if I might only follow you. I'd starve that you might be fed, go thirsty that you might drink, break my body that you might not suffer. I would die if it would give you pleasure.” Seeing that her rhetoric was having no effect, she sank her voice. “When I could have escaped, I waited for you. I risked my freedom for one last sight of you.” She clutched at her breast, choking down a sob. “And you tell me that I'm nothing to you!”

He was determined to remain unmoved by her emotion. Regarding her stonily, he asked: “What right had you to believe that you were anything to me?”

She laughed forlornly. “No right at all.”

“If I had ever cared for you,” he continued, “in your present predicament it would all be ended.”

She raised her brows contemptuously. “Of course.”

“You see, I've found out the sort of woman you are.”

“What sort?”

“Need I recall?”

He turned away, searching hollows and clumps of bushes for bobbing heads of watchers. Her captors might be closing in on her. Her indifference to her danger was disconcerting. With eyes still fixed on the distant landscape, he revealed his thoughts.

“Your talk of love is paltry. It's tragic farce. You have a husband. You're liable to be jailed at any moment.”

He expected she would retort. When she maintained silence, he glanced down at his feet, ashamed of what he felt himself compelled to tell her.

“Love! If it were true, and if your affection were desired, you have no love to offer. Nothing that is you is yours. Your hours are numbered. Your body and your life are forfeit. The man who is your husband is leading the hue-and-cry against you. If you think you can persuade me to go to the scaffold for you, rid yourself of the thought. There'll be no repetition of the woods of Vincennes. The victim in that case was your lover; I'm not.” He met her eyes. “You never deceived me for a second. From the moment we left the Ryndam, I knew who it was had pushed Prince Rogovich overboard.”

“If you knew,” she asked quietly, “why didn't you have me arrested?”