ing somewhere and
I'm in a hurry."

* * * * *

The _voiture_ drew up before the historic old palace in the Boulevard
St. Germain. Chase's heart was beating furiously as he stepped to the
curb. The _cocher_ leaned forward for instructions. His fare hesitated
for a moment, swayed by a momentary indecision.

"_Attendre_" he said finally. The driver adjusted his register and
settled back to wait. Then Chase mounted the steps and lifted the
knocker with trembling fingers. He was dizzy with eagerness, cold with
uncertainty.

She had asked him to come to her--but conditions were not the same as
when she sent the compelling message. There had come into her life a
vital break, a change that altered everything. What was it to mean to
him?

He stood a moment later in the salon of the old Flaurebert palace,
vaguely conscious that the room was darkened by the drawn blinds, and
that it was cool and sweet to his senses. He knew that she was coming
down the broad hallway--he could hear the rustle of her gown.
Inconsequently he was wondering whether she would be dressed in black.
Then, to his humiliation, he remembered that he was wearing uncouth,
travel-soiled garments.

She was dressed in white--a house gown, simple and alluring. There was
no suggestion of the coronet, no shadow of grief in her manner as she
came swiftly toward him, her hands extended, a glad light in her eyes.

The tall man, voiceless with emotion, clasped her hands in his and
looked down into the smiling, rapturous face.

"You came!" she said, almost in a whisper.

"Yes. I could not have stayed away. I have just heard that you--you are
free. You must not expect me to offer condolences. It would be sheer
hypocrisy. I am glad--God, I am glad! You sent for me--you sent the
yacht, Genevra, before--before you were free. I came, knowing that you
belonged to another. I find you the same as when I knew you first--when
I held you in my arms and heard you say that you loved me. You do not
grieve--you do not mourn. You are the same--my Genevra--the same that I
have dreamed of and suffered for all these months. Something tells me
that you have descended to my plane. I will not kiss you, Genevra, until
you have promised to become my wife."

She had not taken her eyes from his white, intense face during this long
summing-up.

"Hollingsworth, I cannot, I will not blame you for thinking ill of me,"
she said. "Have I fallen in your eyes?