“I was afraid you’d do that—­some day,” she said, straightening up and stepping back one pace, so that their linked hands now hung pendant between them.

“I was sure of it, too,” he said.  “Now I think I’d better go—­as all things are en regle, even the kiss, which was classical—­pure—­Louis XVI....  Besides, Scott was idiot enough to shut the door.  That’s Louis XVI, too, but too much realism is never artistic.”

“We could open the door again—­if that’s why you’re running away from me.”

“What’s the use?”

She glanced at the door and then calmly seated herself.

“Do you think that we are together too much?” she asked.

“Hasn’t your husband made similar observations?” he replied, laughing.

“It isn’t for him to make them.”

“Hasn’t he objected?”

“He has suddenly and unaccountably become disagreeable enough to make me wish he had some real grounds for his excitement!” she said coolly, and closed her teeth with a little click.  She added, between them:  “I’m inclined to give him something real to howl about.”

He said:  “You’re adrift.  Do you know it?”

“Certainly I know it.  Are you prepared to offer salvage?  I’m past the need of a pilot.”

He smiled.  “You haven’t drifted very far yet—­only as far as Mallett Harbour.  That’s usually the first port—­for derelicts.  Anchors are dropped rather frequently there—­but, Rosalie, there’s no safe mooring except in the home port.”

Her pretty, flushed face grew very serious as she looked up questioningly.

“Isn’t there an anchorage near you, Duane?  Are you quite sure?”

“Why, no, dear, I’m not sure.  But let me tell you something:  it isn’t in me to love again.  And that isn’t square to you.”

After a silence she repeated:  “Again?  Have you been in love?”

“Yes.”

“Are you embittered?  I thought only callow fledglings moped.”

“If I were embittered I’d offer free anchorage to all comers.  That’s the fledgling idea—­when blighted—­be a ‘deevil among the weemin,’” he said, laughing.

“You have that hospitable reputation now,” she persisted, unsmiling.

“Have I?  Judge for yourself then—­because no woman I ever knew cares anything for me now.”

“You mean that if any of them had anything intimate to remember they’d never remain indifferent?”

“Well—­yes.”

“They’d either hate you or remember you with a certain tenderness.”

“Is that what happens?” he asked, amused.

“I think so,” she said thoughtfully....  “As for what you said, you are right, Duane; I am adrift....  You—­or a man like you could easily board me—­take me in tow.  I’m quite sure that something about me signals a pilot; and that keen eyes and bitter tongues have noted it.  And I don’t care.  Nor do I know yet what my capabilities for evil are....  Do you care to—­find out?”