ted it upon the table, supporting its
weight with the aid of the back of a chair. Then he partook of his
meal deliberately, turning the leaves from time to time and glancing
half idly at the contents.

Presently he was struck by something familiar to him in a picture--a
half-page, badly printed reproduction of a photograph of a vessel.
Languidly interested, he leaned for a nearer scrutiny and a view of
the florid headlines of the column next to the picture.

Yes; he was not mistaken. The engraving was of the eight-hundred-ton
yacht _Idalia_, belonging to "that prince of good fellows, Midas
of the money market, and society's pink of perfection, J. Ward
Tolliver."

Slowly sipping his black coffee, Geddie read the column of print.
Following a listed statement of Mr. Tolliver's real estate and bonds,
came a description of the yacht's furnishings, and then the grain of
news no bigger than a mustard seed. Mr. Tolliver, with a party of
favoured guests, would sail the next day on a six weeks' cruise along
the Central American and South American coasts and among the Bahama
Islands. Among the guests were Mrs. Cumberland Payne and Miss Ida
Payne, of Norfolk.

The writer, with the fatuous presumption that was demanded of him
by his readers, had concocted a romance suited to their palates.
He bracketed the names of Miss Payne and Mr. Tolliver until he had
well-nigh read the marriage ceremony over them. He played coyly and
insinuatingly upon the strings of "_on dit_" and "Madame Rumour"
and "a little bird" and "no one would be surprised," and ended with
congratulations.

Geddie, having finished his breakfast, took his papers to the edge of
the gallery, and sat there in his favourite steamer chair with his
feet on the bamboo railing. He lighted a cigar, and looked out upon
the sea. He felt a glow of satisfaction at finding he was so little
disturbed by what he had read. He told himself that he had conquered
the distress that had sent him, a voluntary exile, to this far
land of the lotus. He could never forget Ida, of course; but there
was no longer any pain in thinking about her. When they had had
that misunderstanding and quarrel he had impulsively sought this
consulship, with the desire to retaliate upon her by detaching
himself from her world and presence. He had succeeded thoroughly in
that. During the twelve months of his life in Coralio no word had
passed between them, though he had sometimes heard of her through the
dil