ness touched Bertrand's
drawn face--"she never will know now."

"Meaning you will never tell her?" Max said.

"Me, I will die first!" Bertrand answered simply.

Max grunted. "Women have an awkward knack of finding things out without
being told," he observed.

"She will never discover this while I live," Bertrand answered. "I am her
friend--the friend of her childhood--nothing more than that."

"But if she did find out?" Max said.

"She will not."

"But--suppose it for a moment--if she did?" He stuck to his point
doggedly, plainly determined to get an answer.

"In that case I should depart at once," Bertrand answered.

"Yes, and where would you go to?"

Bertrand was silent.

"You would go back to London and starve?" Max persisted.

"Perhaps." Bertrand spoke as though the matter were one of indifference
to him. "It would not be for long," he said rather dreamily.

"Oh, rot!" Max's rejoinder was intentionally vehement. "Look here," he
said, as Bertrand looked at him in surprise, "you can't go on like that.
It's too damned foolish. If, for any reason, you do leave this place, you
must have some plan of action. You can't let yourself drift."

"No?" Bertrand still looked surprised.

"No," Max returned vigorously. "Now listen to me, Bertrand. If I am to
keep quiet about this illness of yours, you have got to make me a
promise."

Bertrand raised his brows interrogatively.

"Just this," Max said, "that if you find yourself at a loose end, you
will come to me."

Bertrand looked quizzical. "A loose end?" he questioned.

"You know what it means all right," Max returned sternly. "Is it a
promise?"

"That I come to you if I need a friend?" amended Bertrand. "But--why
should I do that?"

"Because I am a friend if you like," said Max bluntly.

Bertrand's hand closed hard upon his. "I have--no words," he said, in a
voice from which all banter had departed.

Max gripped the hand. "Then it's a promise?"

Bertrand hesitated.

"You have no choice," Max reminded him. "And if you will come to me I can
find a way to help you. It wouldn't even be difficult. And you would have
skilled nursing and attention. Come, it's either that or Trevor will have
to be told. He'll see that you don't go back to starve in the streets."

"I will not have Mr. Mordaunt told," Bertrand said quickly and firmly.

"Then you will give me this promise," Max returned immovably.

With a gesture of helplessness the Frenchman yielded. "_E