She clasped her hands, always her habit when moved.

"So happy!" she said, under her breath; "so perfectly, utterly happy.

How could I ever have thought of marrying any one but you, Laurence--you whom I loved from the very very first?"

"And"--he has the grace to hesitate a little--"it would make you very unhappy if we were forced to part, I suppose, Norry?"

"Part?" She starts, grows very white, and two dilated eyes turn to him.

"Laurence, why do you ask me that? Unhappy? Mon Dieu! it would kill me--just that!"

He laughs a little, but uneasily, and shifts away from the gaze of the large, terrified eyes.

"Kill you? No, you're not the sort that die so easily. Don't look so white and frightened, child; I didn't mean anything, at least, not anything serious; only we have been almost a month here and it is about time I went to pay my respected Uncle Darcy a visit. He has taken to asking unpleasant questions of late--where I am, what I am doing, why I don't report myself at headquarters--meaning his house in New York.

Norry, there's no help for it; I'll have to take a run up to New York."

She sits down suddenly, her hand over her heart, white as the dress she wears.

"Of course I need not stay long," Mr. Thorndyke pursues, his hat still over his eyes; "but go I must, there's no alternative. And then, perhaps, if I get a chance, I can break it to him gently--about you, you know. I hate the thought of leaving you, and all that--nobody more; but still, as I've told you, I'm absolutely depending upon him; the exchequer is running low and must be replenished. Conjugal love is a capital thing, but a fellow can't live on it. Love may come and love may go, but board goes on forever. You'll stay here with the two Waddles, do fancy work, read novels, and take walks, and you'll ever find the time slipping by until I am back. You don't mind, do you, Norine?"

"How long will you be gone?" she asks, in an odd, constrained sort of voice.

"Well, two or three weeks, perhaps. I shall have business to attend to, and--and all that. But I'll be back at the earliest possible moment, be sure of that."

She does not speak. She stands looking, with that white change in her face, over the sunny sea.

"Come, Norine!" he exclaims, impatiently, "you're not going to be a baby, I hope. If you love me, as you say you do--" She turns and looks at him, and he alters the phrase suddenly, with an uneasy laugh. "Well, _since_ you love me so well, Norry, you must try and have a little common sense. Common sense and pretty girls are incompatible, I know; but really, my dear child, you can't expect that our whole lives are to be spent billing and cooing here. It would be very delicious, no doubt"--a great yawn stifles his words for an instant--"but--by Jove!

who's this?"

He raises himself on his elbow, pushes back his hat, and stares hard at an advancing figure. Norine follows his glance, and sees, stepping rapidly over the sand, the small slim figure of a man.

"The--devil!" says Laurence Thorndyke.

He springs to his feet, and stands waiting. The man advances, comes near, lifts his hat to the lady, and looks with a calm glance of recognition at the gentleman. He is a pale, thin, sombre little man, not too well dressed, with keen, small, light blue eyes, and thin, decisive, beardless lips.

"Good-day, Mr. Thorndyke," he says, quietly.

"Liston--it _is_ Liston!" exclaims Mr. Thorndyke, a red, angry flush mounting to his face. "At your usual insolent tricks, I see--dogging me!

May I ask--"

"How I have found you out?" Mr. Liston interrupts, in the same calm, quiet voice. "I knew you were here three weeks ago, Mr. Thorndyke. I saw Maggs--the Reverend Jonas Maggs--in Boston."

He lifts his light, keen eyes for one second to Laurence Thorndyke's, then drops them to the sands. The red flush deepens on the young man's blonde face, his blue eyes flash steely fire.

"By Heaven, you have!" he exclaims, in a suppressed voice. "Has the drunken fool--"

Liston interrupts again:

"I beg your pardon, Mr. Laurence, but if you will step aside with me, I would like to say a few words to you. Meantime, here are two letters--one from your uncle, the other--"

"H'm! All right Liston!" Thorndyke says, hastily, and with a warning glance. "My uncle has sent you to hunt me up as usual, I suppose."

"As usual, Mr. Laurence. He commands your immediate presence in New York."

Again the color mounts to the young man's face, again his eyes flash angry fire.

"Do you mean to say, Liston, that you or that d---- snivelling hypocrite, Maggs--"

"Mr. Thorndyke," says Mr. Liston, interrupting for the third time, and raising his voice slightly, "I have a word to say to you in private--if the young lady will excuse you."

He bows in a sidelong sort of way to Norine, and watches her furtively beneath his drooping eyelids. She is standing very still, her eyes on one of the letters--a square, perfumed, rose-colored letter superscribed in a lady's delicate tracery, and bearing the monogram "H. H." Thorndyke thrusts both abruptly into his pocket, and draws her aside.

"Go back to the house, Norine," he says hastily. "I must hear what this fellow has to say. He's secretary--confidential clerk, valet, factotum generally, to my uncle. And I wish the devil had him before he ever found me out here!"

She obeys passively, very pale, still.

"That------snivelling hypocrite, Maggs!" she is repeating inwardly.

"What a dreadful way to speak of a clergyman!"

Mr. Thorndyke rejoins Mr. Liston, a scowl on his face, his brows lowering and angry.

"Well?" he demands, savagely.

"Well," the new-comer's quiet voice repeats, "don't lose your temper, Mr. Laurence--I haven't done anything. Your uncle told me to hunt you up, and I have hunted you up--that is all."

"When did he tell you, confound him?"

"One week ago, Mr. Laurence."

"A week ago? I thought you said--"

"That I met Maggs three weeks ago? So I did. That he was beastly drunk?

So he was. That he told me all? So he did. That I have kept my eyes upon you, off and on, ever since? So I have. Mr. Laurence, Mr. Laurence, I wonder you're not afraid."

A suppressed oath--no other reply from Mr. Laurence. He gnaws his mustache, and digs vicious holes with his boots in the soft sand.

"You're a bold card, Mr. Laurence," pursues Mr. Liston's monotonous voice. "You've played a good many daring games in your life, but this last daring game I think, has put the topper on the lot. I fancied mock parsons, sham marriages, and carrying off young ladies by night, went out of fashion with Gretna Green and Mrs. Radcliffe's romances. If ever Mr. Darcy hears of it, the sooner you take a rope and hang yourself, the better."

Another smothered imprecation of rage and impatience from Mr. Thorndyke.

"If I only had Maggs here," he says, clenching his fist.

"You would punch his head for him--very likely. But I don't know that even that would do much good. He's got the jim-jams to-day, poor brute, the worst kind. For you, Mr. Laurence--how long before this play of yours is played out?"

"I'm going to New York to-morrow," growls Mr. Laurence Thorndyke. "I was just telling her so as you hove in sight."

"Ah! you were just telling her so--the play _is_ played out, then. May I ask, Mr. Laurence, though it is none of my business, how the poor thing takes it?"

"No, you mayn't ask," replies Mr. Laurence, with ferocity, "as you say it's none of your business. Liston! look here, you're not going to turn State's evidence, are you--honor bright? You are not going to tell the old man."

His angry voice drops to a pleading cadence. Mr. Liston's shifty light eyes look up at him for a moment.