ce drew
nearer to her sister, and Clodagh glanced at Milbanke.

As their eyes met, he involuntarily stiffened his small, spare figure,
and with a quick, nervous manner nodded towards the door.

For a moment Clodagh hesitated, her fear for her father's self-control
dominated by her native interest in an encounter; then Nance decided
the matter by plucking hurriedly at her sleeve.

"Don't stop, Clo!" she whispered almost inaudibly, her small,
expressive face puckered with anxiety--"don't stop! I'm frightened."

The appeal was instantly effective. Clodagh rose at once, and with one
arm passed reassuringly round the child's shoulder, slipped silently
from the room.

For some moments after the two had departed, Asshlin retained his
position: and Milbanke, intently watchful of his tall figure, held
himself nervously in hand for the coming encounter. At last, when the
cloth had been removed, the candles renewed, and the cards placed upon
the table, Asshlin turned--his face flushed with anticipation.

"That's good!" he exclaimed. "That's good! With a bottle of port and a
pack of cards a man could be happy in Hades! Not that I'm forgetting
the good comrade that gives a flavour to the combination, James. Not
that I'm forgetting that."

His smile had much of the charm, his voice much of the warmth that had
marked them long ago, as he drew his chair to the table and picked up
the cards.

Milbanke straightened himself in his seat.

"Come along, man! Draw up!--draw up to the table! What shall it be?
Euchre again? Are you agreeable to the same stakes?" Asshlin talked on,
heedless of the strangely unresponsive demeanour of his guest.

As he ceased to speak, however, Milbanke took the plunge he had been
contemplating all day. In the silence of the room, broken only by the
faint, comfortable hissing of the peat in the fireplace and the
rustling of the cards as Asshlin mechanically shuffled them, he pulled
his chair forward and laid his clasped hands on the table.

"Denis," he said in his thin, quiet voice, "I am sorry--very sorry to
disappoint you, but I cannot play."

Asshlin paused in the act of shuffling and laid the cards down.

"What in the name of fortune are you talking about?" he asked. His tone
was indulgent and amused; it was evident that the meaning in the
other's words had not definitely reached him.

"It is not a joke," Milbanke interposed quickly. "I cannot--I do not
intend to play."

Then for the first t