leave the business that had brought him
renown. Only on one ground he doubted for her, and again and again
feared that such an attractive being as Doria might follow the
tradition of his race and presently weary of one woman.

Next he considered another aspect of the situation and thought of
every word that Jenny had recently spoken. They pointed to one
conclusion in his judgment and he believed that when a seemly period
had elapsed she would allow herself to love Doria. That was as much
as to say she had already begun to do so, if unconsciously. This
surprised him, for even granting the obvious fascination of the man,
he could hardly believe that the image of her first husband had
already begun to grow faint in Jenny's memory. He remembered her
grief and protestations at Princetown; he perceived the deep
mourning which she wore. She was indeed young, but her character had
never appeared to him youthful or light-hearted. Against that fact,
however, he had certainly only known her after her sorrow and loss,
and he remembered how she had sung on the moor upon the evening she
passed him in the sunset light. She had probably been cheerful and
joyous before her husband's death. But she surely never possessed a
frivolous nature. His knowledge of character told him that. And
there was strength as well as sweetness in her face. Serious
subjects had interested her in his small experience of her company;
but that might be because she responded, as a delicate instrument,
to her environment; and he himself had never been anything but
serious beside her. With the Italian, no doubt, there had happened
moments when she could sometimes smile and forget. Doria's own
affairs, of which he loved to chatter, had doubtless often
distracted Mrs. Pendean from her own melancholy reflection, and in
any case she could not sigh forever at her age.

The return of the motor boat arrested his reflections. She had been
gone about an hour when Mark perceived her running very swiftly
homeward. Guessing that Bendigo Redmayne and his brother were now
aboard, he prepared to retire until the following day to the room he
occupied. He had arranged to be invisible unless Robert Redmayne
were willing to see him and discuss the future.

But Doria once more came back to "Crow's Nest" alone, and what he
had to tell soon altered the detective's plans. For Giuseppe was
much concerned and feared that evil had overtaken his master.

"After the time was up, I ran