Withdrawing her hands hastily, as if the volcano had shown some signs of activity, she leaned back on the sofa again.

“You are not yet reconciled to Mr. Keene’s expedition, then?” she asked languidly.

“I believe that everything has been already done,” said Brimmer, somewhat stiffly; “all sources of sensible inquiry have been exhausted by me.  But I envy Keene the eminently practical advantages his impractical journey gives him,” he added, arresting himself, gallantly; “he goes with you.”

“Truly!” said Miss Montgomery, with the melancholy abstraction of a stage soliloquy.  “Beyond obeying the dictates of his brotherly affection, he gains no real advantage in learning whether his sister is alive or dead.  The surety of her death would not make him freer than he is now—­freer to absolutely follow the dictates of a new affection; free to make his own life again.  It is a sister, not a wife, he seeks.”

Mr. Brimmer’s forehead slightly contracted.  He leaned back a little more rigidly in his chair, and fixed a critical, half supercilious look upon her.  She did not seem to notice his almost impertinent scrutiny, but sat silent, with her eyes bent on the carpet, in gloomy abstraction.

“Can you keep a secret?” she said, as if with a sudden resolution.

“Yes,” said Brimmer briefly, without changing his look.

“You know I am a married woman.  You have heard the story of my wrongs?”

“I have heard them,” said Brimmer dryly.

“Well, the husband who abused and deserted me was, I have reason to believe, a passenger on the Excelsior.”

“M’Corkle!—­impossible.  There was no such name on the passenger list.”

“M’Corkle!” repeated Miss Montgomery, with a dissonant tone in her voice and a slight flash in her eyes.  “What are you thinking of?  There never was a Mr. M’Corkle; it was one of my noms de plume.  And where did you hear it?”

“I beg your pardon, I must have got it from the press notices of your book of poetry.  I knew that Montgomery was only a stage name, and as it was necessary that I should have another in making the business investments you were good enough to charge me with, I used what I thought was your real name.  It can be changed, or you can sign M’Corkle.”

“Let it go,” said Miss Montgomery, resuming her former manner.  “What matters?  I wish there was no such thing as business.  Well,” she resumed, after a pause, “my husband’s name is Hurlstone.”

“But there was no Hurlstone on the passenger list either,” said Brimmer.  “I knew them all, and their friends.”

“Not in the list from the States; but if he came on board at Callao, you wouldn’t have known it.  I knew that he arrived there on the Osprey a few days before the Excelsior sailed.”

Mr. Brimmer’s eyes changed their expression.

“And you want to find him?”

“No,” she said, with an actress’s gesture.  “I want to know the truth.  I want to know if I am still tied to this man, or if I am free to follow the dictates of my own conscience,—­to make my life anew,—­to become—­you see I am not ashamed to say it—­to become the honest wife of some honest man.”