the wind was chill, and that a
drift of rain was coming in from the sea. With an impatient shrug he
turned. Why was he lingering here like a drunken reveller at a table
of spilt wine? He would go down to his yacht and find Larpent--Larpent
who had also loved and lost. They would go out on the turn of the
tide--the two losers in the game of life--and leave the spilt wine behind
them.

Impulsively he strode back along the ramparts. The game was over, and he
would never play again; but at least he would face the issue like a man.
No one, not even Larpent, should ever see him flinch. So he reached
the turret-door, and came abruptly to a halt.

It was no vision that showed her to him, standing there in her slender
fairness, wrapt in a cloak that glimmered vaguely blue in the glimmering
starlight. Her face was very pale, and he saw her frightened eyes as she
stood before him. Her hands were tightly clasped together, and she spoke
no word at all.

The door was shut behind her, and he saw that she was trembling from head
to foot.

He stood motionless, within reach of her, but not touching her. "Well?"
he said.

She made a curious gesture with her clasped hands, standing before him as
she had stood on board his yacht on that night in the Mediterranean when
she had come to him for refuge.

"I've come," she said, in a voice that quivered uncontrollably, "to tell
you something."

Saltash did not stir. His face was in shadow, but there was a suggestion
of tension about his attitude that was not reassuring. "Well?" he said
again.

She wrung her hands together with a desperate effort to subdue her
agitation, and began again, "I've come--to tell you something."

"Something I don't know?" he questioned cynically.

She nodded. "Some--some--something you don't want to know. It--it was
Maud made me come."

That moved him a little. That piteous stammer of hers had always touched
his compassion. "Don't fret yourself, _ma chere_!" he said. "I know all
there is to know--all about Rozelle--all about Larpent--all about
Spentoli."

"You--you don't know this," said Toby. "You--you--you don't know--why I
ran away from you--in Paris!"

"Don't I?" he said, and she heard the irony of his voice. "I have an
agile brain, my child. I can generally jump the gaps pretty
successfully."

She shook her head with vehemence. "And how do you know about Spentoli?"
she demanded suddenly. "Who told you that?"

"The man himself," said Saltash.