arnestly she made reply though his eyes were
as points of steel, keeping her back. "I know you will keep a
promise. Please--promise me that!"

"Yes," he said drily. "I keep my promises. He can testify to
that. So can you. But if I promise you this, you must make me a
promise too."

"What is it?" she said.

"Simply that you will never have anything more to do with him
without my knowledge--and consent." He uttered the words with the
same pitiless distinctness as had characterized his speech when
dictating to Kieff.

She drew sharply. "Oh, but why--why ask such a promise of me when
you have only just proved your own belief in me?"

"How have I done that?" he said.

"By taking my part before all those horrible men downstairs." She
suppressed a hard shudder. "By--defending my honour."

Burke's face remained immovable. "I was defending my own," he
said. "I should have done that--in any case."

She made a little hopeless movement with her hands and dropped them
to her sides. "Oh, how hard you are!" she said, "How hard--and how
cruel!"

He lifted his shoulders slightly, and turned away in silence.
Perhaps there was more of forbearance in that silence than she
realized.

He did not ask her where she had been with Kelly or comment upon
the fact that she had been out at all. Only after a brief pause he
told her that they would not leave till the following day as he had
some business to attend to. Then to her relief he left her. At
least he had promised that he would not go in search of Guy!

Later in the evening, a small packet was brought to her which she
found to contain some money in notes wrapped in a slip of paper on
which was scrawled a few words.

"I have done my best with young G., but he is rather out of hand
for the present. I enclose the 'loan.' Just put it back, and
don't worry any more. Yours, D. K."

She put the packet away with a great relief at her heart. That
danger then, had been averted. There yet remained a chance for
Guy. He was not--still he was not--quite beyond redemption. If
only--ah, if only--she could have gone to Burke with the whole
story! But Burke had become a stranger to her. She had begun to
wonder if she had ever really known him. His implacability
frightened her almost more than his terrible vindictiveness. She
felt that she could never again turn to him with confidence.

That silence that lay between them was like an ever-widening gulf
severing th