yielded to the hand upon his arm when Hallam
glanced in their direction and signed to him. Then he shook off the
girl's grasp and she shivered a little for no apparent reason as they
went in together. There was nobody else about, for Mrs. Forel and her
husband had gone down to the city, and she sat alone on the verandah
while a murmur of voices reached her through an open window. Though
his words were inaudible her father appeared to be expostulating. Then
he came out, and as she noticed there was an unusual pallor in his face
and that his hands were trembling, she remembered he had looked as he
did then once before when a partial failure of the heart's action had
almost cost him his life.

"You must send Mr. Hallam away at once," she said.

Deringham made a gesture of impatience. "I shall be rid of him
altogether in a few more minutes. You have some money by you?"

"Yes," said the girl. "I am not fond of going to the bank, and got Mr.
Forel to change my English cheque into currency, but why do you want
it?"

"Hallam has to catch the steamer, and the banks are shut. Don't ask
questions now, but get me the money quick."

Alice Deringham went in, and returned with a little satchel. "This is
all I have, and I don't feel very willing to lend it Mr. Hallam," she
said.

Deringham took the satchel from her and moved away; then, as though
acting under impulse, he stopped and looked back at her.

"Thank you, my dear," he said, with a curious gentleness. "It has
relieved me of a good deal of anxiety."

He went away, and Alice Deringham, hearing the door close behind him,
wondered a little. When she next looked up she saw Hallam swinging
with hasty strides down the road, and a little later the roar of a
whistle rang about the pines as a big white steamer moved out into the
inlet. A cloud of yellow vapour rolled from her funnel, there was a
frothing wash beneath her towering sides, and the girl watched her
languidly until the pines which shroud the Narrows shut the great white
fabric from her sight and left only a moving trail of smoke.

Then she felt happier. The steamer had at least taken Hallam away, and
her father was not now the courtly though somewhat reserved gentleman
who had treated her with indulgent kindness until Hallam crossed his
path. It was a fine evening, and she sat still on the verandah
wondering how the rift had imperceptibly widened between them, until
again the blood crept to her foreh