“What is the matter, dear?  Am I not nice to you?”

“Yes, Evelyn, you’re an enchantment.  Only—­”

“Only what, dear?”

“I fear our future.  I fear I shall lose you.  All has come true so far, the end must happen.”

She drew his arm about her waist, and laid his face on her bare shoulder.

“Let there be no foreboding.  Live in the present.”

“The future is too near us.  Say you’ll marry me, or else I shall lose you altogether.  It is the one influence on our side.”

She was born, he said, under two great influences, but each could be modified; one might be widened, the other lessened, and both modifications might finally resolve into her destiny.  So far as he could read her future, it centred in him or another.  That other, he was sure, was not Sir Owen, nor was it himself, he thought; for when she and he had met in the theatre, she had experienced no dread, but he had dreaded her, recognising her as his destiny.  He had even recognised her as Evelyn Innes before she had been pointed out to him.

“But you had seen my photograph?”

“But it was not by your photograph that I knew you.”

“And you knew that I should care for you?”

“I knew that something had to happen.  But you did not feel that I was your destiny.  You said you experienced no dread, but when you met Sir Owen did you experience none?”

“I suppose I did.  I was afraid of him.  At first I think I hated him.”

“Ah, Evelyn, we shall not marry—­it is not our fate.  You see that you cannot say you will marry me.  Another fate is beckoning you.”

“Who is it who beckons me?  Have I already met him?”

He fell to dreaming again, and Evelyn asked him vainly to describe this other man.

“Why are you singing that melancholy Mark motive?”

“I did not know I was singing it.”  He returned to his dream again, but starting from it, he seized her hands.

“Evelyn,” he said, “we must marry; a reason obliges us.  Have you not thought of it?” And then, as if he had not noticed that she had not answered his question, he said, “On your father’s account, if he should ever know.  Think what my position is.  I have betrayed my friend.  That is why the Marie motive has been singing in my head.  Evelyn, you must say you will marry me.  We must marry at once, for your father’s sake.  I have betrayed him, my best friend....  I have acted worse than that other man.”

“Ulick, dear, open the window; the scent of these flowers is overpowering....  That is better.  Throw some of those bouquets into the street.  We might give them to those poor men, they might be able to sell them....  Tell the coachman to stop.”

The chime of destiny sounded clearer than ever in their ears; it seemed as if they could almost catch the tune, and with a convulsive movement Evelyn drew her lover towards her.

“Every hour threatens us,” he said.  “Can you not hear?  Do not go to Park Lane—­Park Lane threatens; your friend Lady Duckle threatens.  I see nothing but threats and menaces; all are leagued against us.”