ow. We will go to the hotel and try to get a
list of the passengers."

She rose, and they walked slowly back along the avenue.

CHAPTER II

ON THE RIVER BOAT

Dusk was falling on the broad river, and the bold ridge behind the city
stood out sharp and black against a fading gleam in the western sky. A
big, sidewheel steamer, spotlessly white, with tiers of decks that
towered above the sheds and blazed with light, was receiving the last
of her passengers and preparing to cast off from her moorings. Richard
Blake hurried along the wharf and, on reaching the gangplank, stood
aside to let an elderly lady pass. She was followed by her maid and a
girl whose face he could not see. It was a few minutes after the
sailing time, and as the lady stepped on board a rope fell with a
splash. There was a shout of warning as the bows, caught by the
current, began to swing out into the stream, and the end of the
gangplank slipped along the edge of the wharf. It threatened to fall
into the river, and the girl was not yet on board. Blake leaped upon
the plank. Seizing her shoulder, he drove her forward until a seaman,
reaching out, drew her safe on deck. Then the paddles splashed and as
the boat forged out into the stream, the girl turned and thanked Blake.
He could not see her clearly, for an overarching deck cast a shadow on
her face.

"Glad to have been of assistance; but I don't think you could have
fallen in," he said. "The guy-rope they had on the gangplank might
have held it up."

Turning away, he entered the smoking-room, where he spent a while over
an English newspaper that devoted some space to social functions and
the doings of people of importance, noticing once or twice, with a
curious smile, mention of names he knew. He had the gift of making
friends, and before he went to India he had met a number of men and
women of note who had been disposed to like him. Then he had won the
good opinion of responsible officers on the turbulent frontier and had
made acquaintances that might have been valuable. Now, however, he had
done with all that; he was banished from the world in which they moved,
and if they ever remembered him it was, no doubt, as one who had gone
under.

Shaking off these thoughts, he joined some Americans in a game of
cards, and it was late at night when he went out into the moonlight as
the boat steamed up Lake St. Peter. A long plume of smoke trailed
across the cloudless sky, the wate