rom here?"

"Only down the grand staircase."

"I must risk it. Show me the way."

They went together down the almost dark corridor. Fay's heart sickened
at the thought that a belated servant might see them. But all was quiet.
At the head of the staircase they both peered over the balustrade. At
its foot in a narrow circle of light stood the duke and Lord John, and a
man with a tri-coloured sash. Even as they looked, the three turned and
began slowly to mount the staircase.

Fay and Michael were back in her boudoir in a moment.

"There is a way out here," he said, indicating the door into her
bedroom.

"It leads into my bedroom, and then through to Andrea's rooms. There is
no passage, and he has a dog in his room. It would bark."

"I must go back to the garden again," he said, and instantly moved to
the window. Both saw two _carabinieri_ standing with a lantern at the
foot of the balcony steps.

"If you go down now," said Fay hoarsely, "my reputation goes with you."

He looked at her.

It was as if his whole life were focussed on one burning point; how to
save her from suspicion. If he could have shrivelled into ashes at her
feet he would have done it. She saw her frightful predicament, and
almost hated him.

The animal panic of being trapped caught them both simultaneously. He
overcame it instantly, while she shook helplessly as in a palsy.

He went swiftly back to the door leading to the staircase, and glanced
through it.

"They are coming along the corridor," he said. "They will certainly come
in here."

"Stand behind the screen," she gasped. "I will say no one has been here,
and they will pass through into the other room. As soon as they have
left the room go quickly out by the staircase."

He looked round him once, and then walked behind a tall screen of
Italian leather which stood at the head of a divan.

Fay took up her book from the floor, but her numb fingers refused to
hold it. She put it on the edge of the table near her, under the lamp,
hid her shaking hands in the folds of her long white chiffon gown, and
fixed her eyes upon the page.

The words of the dead saint swam before her eyes:

"_Yea, He loveth us now as well while we are here, as He shall do while
we are there afore His blessed face. But for failing of love on our
part, therefore is all our travail._"

There were subdued footsteps outside, a tap, the duke's voice.

"May I come in?"

"Come in," she said, but she heard no w