“No.”  He spoke with slight effort.  “I am—­grateful to him.”

“But you don’t like him?” she said.

He hesitated momentarily.  “Do you?”

“Yes, of course.”  Her brows contracted a little.  “I can’t help it.  I always have,” she said rather wistfully.

He bent abruptly and kissed them.  “All right, darling.  So do I,” he said.

She smiled at him, clinging closely.  “Dicky, that’s the most generous thing you ever did!”

“Oh, I can afford to be generous,” he said, “now that I know your secrets and you know mine.  Will you tell me something else now, Juliet?”

“Yes, dear,” she whispered.

He laid his cheek against hers.  “I was going to tell you my secret when you had read that last book of mine.  When were you going to tell me yours?”

“Oh, Dicky!” she said in some confusion, and hid her face against his neck.

“No, tell me!” he said.  “I want to know.”

But Juliet only clung a little faster to him and buried her face a little deeper.

“Weren’t you ever going to tell me?” he said, after a moment.

“Oh, yes—­some time,” she murmured from his breast.

“Well, when?” he persisted.  “Just—­any time?”

“No, dear, of course not!” A muffled sound that was half-sob and half-laugh came with the words.

Dick waited for a space, and then very gently began to feel for the hidden face.  She tried to resist him, then, finding he would not be resisted, she took his hand and pressed it over her eyes, holding it as a shield between them.

“Won’t you tell me?” he said.

She trembled a little in his hold.  “That—­that—­is another secret, Dicky,” she said very softly.

“Mayn’t I—­share it, sweetheart?” he said.

She uncovered her eyes with a little tremulous laugh, and lifted them to his.  “Oh, I’m a coward, Dicky, a horrid coward.  I thought—­I thought I would tell you everything when—­when you were holding your son in your arms.  I thought you would have to—­forgive me then.”

“Oh, Juliet—­Juliet!” he said, and tried to smile in answer, but could not.  His lips quivered suddenly, and he laid his head down upon her breast.

And so, with her arms around him and the warm throbbing of her heart against his face, he came to the perfect understanding.

They saw the morning break through a silver mist, standing side by side on deck with the water sweeping snow-white from their keel.

Juliet, within the circle of her husband’s arm, looked up and broke the silence with a sigh and a smile.

“Good morning, Romeo!  And now that I’ve learnt my lesson, hadn’t we better be going home?”

He kissed her, and drew her cloak more closely round her.  “Do you want to go home?” he said.

She looked at him with a whimsical frown.  “Well, I think I am at home wherever you are.  But you are such a busy man.  You can’t be spared.”