-eh?" he whispered
in deep earnestness as he still bent to her over the table, his eyes
fixed on hers. And he drew a long breath.

"Yes," she answered. "But why do you ask the question in that tone?
How tragic you seem!"

"Because," and he sighed, "because your answer lifts a great weight
from my mind." Then, after a pause, he added: "Yet--yet, I wonder----"

"Wonder what?"

"Nothing," he answered. "I was only wondering."

"But you really are tantalizing to-night, my dear boy," she said. "I
don't understand you at all."

"Ah! you will before long. Let's go out into the lounge," he
suggested. "It's growing late."

So, having drained their two glasses of triple sec, they passed out
into the big palm-lounge, which is so popular with the Parisians after
the play.

Peggy and her parents had come to Paris in mid-December to do some
shopping. Before she had been exiled to China, Lady Urquhart's habit
was to go to Paris twice each year to buy her hats and gowns, for she
was always elegantly dressed, and she took care that her daughter
should dress equally well.

Indeed, the gown worn by Peggy that night was one of Worth's latest
creations, and her cloak was an expensive one of the newest _mode_.
They were staying at the Continental when Charlie, who had some
business in Paris on behalf of his firm, had run over for three days
really to meet in secret the girl he loved. That night Peggy had
excused herself to her mother, saying that she was going out to
Neuilly to dine with an old schoolfellow--a little matter she had
arranged with the latter--but instead, she had met Charlie at
Voisin's, and they had been to the theater together.

Peggy, amid the exuberant atmosphere of Paris with its lights,
movement and gaiety--the old Paris just as it was before the
war--naturally expected her lover to be gay and irresponsible as she
herself felt. Instead, he seemed gloomy and apprehensive. Therefore
the girl was disappointed. She thought a good deal, but said little.

Though the distance between the Volnay and the Rue de Rivoli was not
great, Charlie ordered a taxi, and on the way she sat locked in his
strong arms, her lips smothered with his hot, passionate kisses, until
they parted.

Little did she dream, however, the bitterness in her lover's heart.

Next morning at eleven o'clock, as Peggy was coming up the Avenue de
l'Opera, she passed the Brasserie de la Paix, that popular cafe on the
left-hand side of the broad thor