“Letter?  I have no time to write letters.  Oh, I beg pardon, letter for me?” He took the missive from the silver tray and stuffed it absent-mindedly into a pocket, fumbling meanwhile for a tip.  “I don’t seem to have any money, my boy, but money, after all, means nothing.”

“It is h’impartant, sar.”

“Oh yes, the letter.  Very well.”  He opened the envelope and pretended to read, but in reality the sheet held nothing for him but a ravishing, mischievous face, with pansy eyes.  He must have stood staring unseeingly at it for several seconds.  Then the dancing visions faded and the scrawl stood out plainly: 

Williams, detective, St. Louis, arrived at Colon this evening on the Prince Joachim.  You’d better take it on the run.

It was written upon Tivoli paper, but the hand was strange and it was not signed.

“Well!” Kirk came suddenly to himself, and a spasm of disgust seized him.  “What a rotten inconvenience!” he said aloud.  But before he had time to measure the effect of this new complication the swelling music reminded him that this dance belonged to Mrs. Cortlandt and that her answer was due.

She was waiting for him in the gallery, and motioned him to the chair adjoining hers.

“I can’t two-step and talk at the same time,” she said, “and here we’ll be quite private.”

Kirk remained standing.  “What I have to say won’t take long.  I’ve made up my mind, and I—­”

Edith interrupted him with a lightness that her look belied: 

“Oh, let’s not discuss it.  I don’t want you to answer.  I don’t want to think of it.  I just want to forget—­and to plan.  You understand how I feel?” She faced him with eyes bright and lustrous, her red lips parted in a smile.  She was a very beautiful woman, Kirk realized—­a very compelling, unusual woman, and one whose capabilities seemed unbounded.  He began dimly to perceive that all women have great capabilities for good or evil, depending largely upon the accident of their environment, and with this thought came the feeling that he must speak frankly now or prove himself worse than base.  If only she were of the weakly feminine type his task would be far easier.  But it was hard to strike her, for the very reason that he knew she would take the blow bravely and meet its full force.

“I must answer,” he said.  “I don’t want to pretend; I’m not good at lying.  I can’t go through with any such arrangement as you suggested.  Why, the very idea is positively—­fierce.  You’ve been awfully nice to me, but I had no idea of—­this.  Besides, Cortlandt’s an awfully decent chap, and—­and, well,” he concluded, lamely, “there are lots of reasons.”

“Oh no!  There is only one reason; all the others count for nothing.”  She spoke in a voice that he could scarcely hear.

“Perhaps!  But it’s—­just impossible.”