She shook slightly under his hands.

“Why are you trembling?”

“I’m not trembling; but I’m tired; let me alone.”

“You can go to Sonia now if you like, and have your hand bathed.”

He lifted his hands from her shoulders, but she did not move.

“What are you going to do?” she asked.

“I shall wait for you here.”

“Wait for me?”

“Yes.  We’ll dine together to-night.”

“Where?” she said helplessly.

“Here, if you like.”

“There’s scarcely anything to eat.  I didn’t intend——­”

“I’ll take you out somewhere.  It’s going to be a dark night.  We’ll manage so that no one sees us.  We’ll dine together and, after dinner——­”

“I must come home early.  I’m very tired.”

“After dinner we’ll go to those rooms you found so cleverly near the Persian Khan.”

She shuddered.

“Now go and bathe your hand, and I’ll wait here.  Only don’t be too long or I shall come and fetch you.  And don’t send Sonia to make excuses, for it will be no use.”

He sat down on the sofa.

She stood for a moment without moving.  She put her bandaged hand up to her discolored face.  Then she went slowly out of the room.

He sat waiting for her to come back, with his elbows on his knees and his face hidden in his hands.

He felt like a man sunk in mire.  He felt the mire creeping up to his throat.

* * * * *

Almost at that same hour beside a platform at Victoria Station in London a long train with “Dover” placarded on it was drawn up.  Before the door of a first-class carriage two women in plain traveling dresses were standing with a white-haired clergyman.  Presently the shorter of the two women said to the other: 

“I think I’ll get in now, and leave you to last words.”

She held out her hand to the clergyman.

“Good-by, Father Robertson.”

He grasped her hand warmly, and looked at her with a great tenderness shining in his eyes.

“Take good care of her.  But you will, I know,” he said.

Beatrice Daventry got into the carriage, and stood for a moment at the door.  There were tears in her eyes as she looked at the two figures now pacing slowly up and down on the platform; she wiped them away quickly, and sat down.  She was bound on a long journey.  And what would be the end?  In her frail body Beatrice had a strong soul, but to-night she was stricken with a painful anxiety.  She said to herself that she cared about something too much.  If the object of this journey were not attained she felt it would break her heart.  She shut her eyes, and she conjured up a child whom she had loved very much and who was dead.

“Come with us, Robin!” she whispered.  “Come with us to your father.”

And the whisper was like a prayer.

“Beattie!”

Rosamund’s voice was speaking.