a general laugh broke the
silence. Rupert laughed with the rest, no whit embarrassed by the
question.

"Not at all, Beauty," he said calmly. "I need a great passion in
return, and you are incapable of it. Most women are! I doubt if in the
whole course of my life I have met one who could rise to it," and he
cast a quick glance round the group until his eyes met those of his
hostess.

"Very few men would understand what you are talking about, or, if they
did, would desire so demanding a romance," Mrs Ingram told him. "The
man who _does_ will find his mate, but--he must pay the price! So we
have come to Love at last! I thought it would have taken an earlier
place."

"Mrs Ingram," cried Claudia boldly, "was _that_ what you wished for
yourself? You told us you had proved your own theories. Did _you_ wish
for love?"

"No!" said the hostess quietly. "It was not love." She glanced across
the hearth as she spoke, and her eyes and her husband's met, and
exchanged a message.

The man with the magnetic eyes burst hastily into the conversation, as
if anxious to divert attention to himself.

"I suppose I come next? I've been questioning myself while you've all
been talking. It's difficult to condense one's ambitions into just one
word, but I've got it at last--or the one which most nearly expresses
what I mean. _Danger_! That's it. That's what I want. I'm fed up
with monotony, and convention, and civilisation, but I go a step farther
than Miss Juliet, for I demand, so to speak, the superlative of
adventure. Risk, uncertainty, the thrill, the fear! I want to take my
life in my hands, to get out into the open of life, and come face to
face with the unknown. Put me down as `Danger,' Mrs Ingram, and when
you think over all the wishes, mine really seems the easiest of
fulfilment. There's plenty of trouble knocking around, and a man need
not have far to search. I think, on the whole, I'll absolve my friends
from that promise to help! It might land them in disagreeable
consequences!"

"But are we expected to wish you good luck? It really _is_ an invidious
position!" cried the girl in blue. She sighed, and twisted her fingers
together in her lap.

"It's coming to my turn," she continued, "and I'm so horribly
embarrassed, for my confession sounds the most selfish of all: I want
just to be happy! That's all! But it means so much, and it's such a
difficult thing to accomplish. Don't anyone _dare_ to tell