ped
upon the pavement.

"Very well," she said, "I regret having given you so much trouble;" and
she went toward the landing. She took three steps and then turned. The
two men stood as she had left them.

"Phelim," she said, smiling, "_you_ would do something for me, if I were
to ask you, would you not?"

"Try me," said Phelim. "Would you like the Campanile for a
paper-weight?"

"No," she said, "not that, but something else. Come here."

He went to her, and she whispered in his ear.

"I'll bring it you in half an hour, aboard the yacht," said Phelim, and
he started across the Piazza.

Lady Nora went on toward the landing. The earl stood watching her. She
did not look back. The earl looked up at the clock-tower. "In half an
hour," he said to himself, "he will bring it to her, aboard the yacht;"
and he turned and re-entered the church. He went up the aisle, nodded to
the sacristan, entered the treasury, took the turquoise cup, came out
with it in his hand, nodded again to the sacristan, went down the steps,
crossed the Piazza, ran down the landing-stairs, and jumped into a
gondola.

"To the English yacht!" he cried.

He looked at his watch. "It seems," he said to himself "that one can
join the criminal classes in about six minutes. I've twenty-four the
start of Phelim."

They came alongside the Tara, and the earl sprang up the ladder.

"Lady Nora?" he asked of the quartermaster.

"She is below, my lord. She has just come aboard, and she left orders to
show you down, my lord."

"Me?" exclaimed the earl.

"She didn't name you, my lord;" said the quartermaster, "what she said
was--'A gentleman will come on board soon; show him below.'"

The earl speculated a moment as to whether he were still a gentleman,
and then went down the companion-way. He came to the saloon. The door
was open. He looked in. Lady Nora was seated at the piano, but her hands
were clasped in her lap. Her head was bent and the earl noticed, for the
thousandth time, how the hair clustered in her neck and framed the
little, close-set ear. He saw the pure outlines of her shoulders;
beneath the bench, he saw her foot in its white shoe; he saw, or felt,
he could not have told you which, that here was the one woman in all
this great world. To love her was a distinction. To sin for her was a
dispensation. To achieve her was a coronation.

He tapped on the door. The girl did not turn, but she put her hands on
the keys quickly, as if ashamed to