home and take care of your own?"

"I guess I better." And she departed forthwith.

CHAPTER VIII

The two sisters had managed to fray each other's nerves raw. The mere
fact that Abbie advocated marriage and maternity threw Mamise into a
cantankerous distaste for her own dreams.

Larrey had delayed Davidge long enough for Mamise to be rid of Abbie,
but the influence of both Larrey and Abbie was manifest in the
strained greetings of the caller and the callee. Instead of the
eagerness to rush into each other's arms that both had felt in the
morning, Davidge entered Mamise's presence with one thought dominant:
"Is she really a spy? I must be on my guard." And Mamise was thinking,
"If he should be thinking what Abbie thought, how odious!"

Thus once more their moods chaperoned them. Love could not attune
them. She sat; he sat. When their glances met they parted at once.

She mistook his uncertainty for despondency. She assumed that he was
brooding over his lost ship. Out of a long silence she spoke:

"I wonder if the world will ever forget and forgive?"

"Forget and forgive who--whom, for what?"

"Germany for all she's done to this poor world--Belgium, the
_Lusitania_, the _Clara_?"

He smiled sadly. "The _Clara_ was a little slow tub compared to the
_Lusitania_, but she meant a lot to me."

"And to me. So did the _Lusitania_. She nearly cost me my life."

He was startled. "You didn't plan to sail on her?"

"No, but--" She paused. She had not meant to open this subject.

But he was aching to hear her version of what Larrey had told.

"How do you mean--she nearly cost you your life?"

"Oh, that's one of the dark chapters of my past."

"You never told me about it."

"I'd rather not."

"Please!" He said it with a surprising earnestness. He had a sudden
hope that her confession might be an absolving explanation.

She could not fathom this eagerness, but she felt a desire to release
that old secret. She began, recklessly:

"Well, I told you how I ran away from home and went on the stage, and
Sir Joseph Webling--"

"You told me that much, but not what happened before you met him."

"No, I didn't tell you that, and I'm not going to now, but--well, Sir
Joseph was like a father to me; I never had one of my own--to know and
remember. Sir Joseph was German born, and perhaps the ruthlessness was
contagious, for he--well, I can't tell you."

"Please!"

"I swore not to."

"You gave your oath to a Ge