reble, that danger."

"My dear boy--" began the actor again, but his wife restrained him, and
Ramsey whispered at him in turn:

"Tsh-sh!" Then she prompted Hugh: "And so----?"

"So you must sing without any urging but mine."

Her lips parted in droll repudiation, but he went on.

"And you'll give the encore."

"Oh, when did you learn to talk? I--w-i-l-l--n-o-t!"

Once more the actor tried to break in, but his wife eagerly whispered:
"Let them alone! Let--them--alone!"

"Success hangs on it," persisted Hugh, "and success here means success
all over the boat. It will mean their" (the Gilmores') "safety; while
failure-- Think of it, Miss Ramsey.... Don't you see?"

She stared an instant and then with a sign of distress and aversion
gasped: "Go away! Go away!" and dropping to the berth cast her face into
its pillow. With gentle speed Mrs. Gilmore pressed Hugh aside and took
his place. The stamping and pounding, for a moment suspended, broke
forth afresh. "Send him away!" cried Ramsey, her voice muffled by the
pillow, one eye fitfully glancing from it, and one arm waving backward.
"All advice rejected! Send him away! Send them both."

With such dignity as they could save, the two outcasts fled, meeting and
turning back half the stage company while the actor's wife shut the
door.

"Is she ill?" asked the gaping girls. "Is she ill?"

"Not at all," "No," said the actor and Hugh, right and left, the one
complacent, the other "ironer" than ever. "She is, eh--she, eh----"

Every head was lifted to hearken. The cabin's applause ceased abruptly
for a second or two, or three. Then again there was a stillness broken
only by the speeding of the boat; and then, like a perfume from some
wilderness garden, came the untrained notes of a song, a maiden's song
of her lost German home, and leaning elatedly from the reopened door
Mrs. Gilmore loudly whispered:

"She's on!"

XL

RAMSEY AT THE FOOTLIGHTS

The actor stepped to his wife. "Will she do it all?" he inquired, and
Hugh, who had started to join the audience by a short cross passage,
lingered to hear.

"Heaven knows," laughed the lady, shutting herself out, yet keeping the
door; "I too am banished." Her glance drew Hugh nearer. "Miss Ramsey
begs us, all three----"

"For her to beg is to command," said Gilmore playfully.

"Yes, and so I've promised for all three----"

"Promised! What?"

Mrs. Gilmore whispered: "To pray for her."

The smiling actor an