“How the—­” he began, but checked the expletive, which found vent elsewhere, as expletives will.  “Where the devil did he come from?”

“From Europe, I believe,” said she.  “Don’t swear about it.”

“Excuse me, Vick, I am bowled out; I was never so taken aback in my life.  Tell me all about it, Vick.”  And he slowly recovered his senses enough to appreciate that Claudius had really arrived, and that he, the friend who had taken so much trouble, had somehow missed him after all.  But he was honestly glad.

“I only saw him a moment, and I came in to your room to wait.  Of course I let him go in there alone.”

“Of course,” assented her brother gravely.

“Margaret was waiting for him, for she got your telegram that the ship was in sight at three o’clock, and he got here at five; I thought it was very quick.”

“Devilish quick, indeed,” said her profane brother under his breath.  “Tell me all about it,” he added aloud.

It was easily enough explained, and before they went to bed that night every one understood it all.  It was simply this—­Claudius had come by another steamer, one of the German line, and had chanced to arrive a couple of hours before the Cunarder.  Margaret had received the Duke’s message, as Lady Victoria had said, and, as Claudius appeared soon afterwards, she saw no discrepancy.

The tall Doctor left his slender luggage to the mercy of the Custom House, and, hailing a cab, paid the man double fare in advance to hurry to the hotel.  He could hardly wait while the servant went through the formality of taking up his name to the Countess, and when the message came back that he would “please to step up upstairs,” as the stereotyped American hotel phrase has it, he seemed indeed to make of the stairway but a single step.

One moment more, and he was kneeling at her feet, trembling in every limb and speechless, but kissing the fair white hands again and again, while she bent down her flushed dark cheek till it touched his yellow hair.  Then he stood up to his height and kissed her forehead and clasped his fingers about her waist and held her up to the length of his mighty arms before him, unconscious, in his overmastering happiness, of the strength he was exerting.  But she laughed happily, and her eyes flashed in pride of such a man.

“Forgive me, my beloved,” he said at last.  “I am beside myself with joy.”  She hid her face on his breast as they stood together.

“Are you very glad to come back?” she asked at last, looking up to him with a smile that told the answer.

“Glad is too poor a word, my dear, dear lady,” he said simply.

* * * * *

Two hours later they were still seated side by side on the deep sofa.  Claudius had told her everything, for, now that he had accomplished his mission, there were to be no more secrets; and there were tears in Margaret’s dark eyes as she heard, for she knew what it had cost him to leave her, knowing how he loved.  And then they talked on.