f her pretty
head, "I don't suppose the change would be for the worse. But there's
one thing certain, I shall have to snare the oof bird very shortly, for
the first thing I'm going to do when we get to the flat is to send back
every penny of the money that Reginald gave me when we said good-bye. Of
course I didn't know anything about it, but it seems worse a good deal
than if I had stolen it. Then to-night we'll go to the Empire, and you,
being rather more married than I am, can chaperone me."

"All right," said Dora. "I'll send a wire to Bernard, and perhaps he'll
come too and escort us."

Reginald Garthorne had behaved, as both the world and the half-world
would have said, very honourably to Carol when they had said the usual
good-bye before his marriage. He had paid his share of the rent of the
flat for her for six months ahead, and had given her a couple of hundred
pounds to go on with. Of this considerably over a hundred pounds
remained. She changed the gold into notes, and even the silver into
postal orders, and put the whole sum into a packet, which she registered
and posted to his town address.

She gave no explanation or reason for what she was doing. In the first
place she could not bring herself to tell him the dreadful truth that
she had discovered; and then, again, it would only after all be a piece
of needless cruelty. During her connection with him he had always
treated her with kindness and courtesy, and often with generosity. She
had nothing whatever against him, so why should she wreck the happiness
of his honeymoon, and perhaps of his whole married life, by disclosing
the secret that had been so strangely revealed to her? So she simply
wrote:

"DEAR MR. GARTHORNE,

"You have been very kind to me, and I thoroughly appreciate your
kindness. But something has happened to-day--I daresay you can
guess what it is--which makes it unnecessary to me, and, as you
know I have rather curious ideas about money matters, I hope you
will understand my reasons, and not be offended by my returning it
to you with many thanks.

"Yours very sincerely,
"CAROL VANE."

Under the circumstances the white lie was one which the Recording Angel
might well have blotted out. Probably he did. But, as the Fates would
have it, the words proved prophetic.

They went to the Empire that night under the escort of Mr. Bernard
Falcon, and while they were having a stroll round the prome