So it was true,
then, this horrible thing, this sacrilege, this ruin, that had fallen
upon his life and hers. Natas had spoken of giving her to this man as
quietly as though it had been the most natural proceeding possible,
an understood arrangement about which there could be no question.
Well, he had sworn, and he would obey, but there would be a heavy
price to pay for his obedience.

He did not see Natasha again that night. When the _Ithuriel_ rose
into the air she was in her cabin with the Princess, and did not
appear during the voyage save at meals, when all the others were
present, and then she joined in the conversation with a composure
which showed that, externally at least, she had quite regained her
habitual self-control.

Arnold spent the greater part of the voyage in the deck-saloon with
Tremayne, talking over the events of the war, and arranging plans of
future action. By mutual consent the object of their present voyage
was not mentioned. As Arnold was more than two months and a half
behind the news, he found not a little relief in hearing from
Tremayne of all that had taken place since the recapture of the
_Lucifer_.

The two men, who were now to be the active leaders of the Revolution
which, as they hoped, was soon to overturn the whole fabric of
Society, and introduce a new social order of things, conversed in
this fashion, quietly discussing the terrific tragedy in which they
were to play the leading parts, and arranging all the details of
their joint action, until well into the night of the 17th.

About eleven Tremayne went to his cabin, and Arnold, going to the
conning-tower, told the man on the look-out to go below until he was
called. Then he took his place, and remained alone with his thoughts
as the _Ithuriel_ sped on her way a thousand feet above the deserted
waters of the Atlantic, until the dark mass of the American Continent
loomed up in front of him to the westward.

As soon as he sighted land he went aft to the wheel-house, and
slightly inclined the air-planes, causing the _Ithuriel_ to soar
upwards until the barometer marked a height of 6000 feet. At this
elevation he passed over the mouth of the Chesapeake, and across
Virginia; and a little more than an hour before sunrise the
_Ithuriel_ sank to the earth on one of the spurs of the Alleghanies,
in sight of a lonely weather-board house, in one of the windows of
which three lights were burning in the form of a triangle.

This build