communicative. Her husband had NOT been ordered out to sea by them;
she ought to know that Captain Bunker was now his own master, choosing
his own fishing grounds, and his own times and seasons. He was not
aware of any secret service for the Company in which Captain Bunker was
engaged. He hoped Mrs. Bunker would distinctly remember that the little
matter of the duel to which she referred was an old bygone affair,
and never anything but a personal matter, in which the Fishery had no
concern whatever, and in which HE certainly should not again engage. He
would advise Mrs. Bunker, if she valued her own good, and especially her
husband's, to speedily forget all about it. These were ugly times, as
it was. If Mrs. Bunker's services had not been properly rewarded or
considered it was certainly a great shame, but really HE could not be
expected to make it good. Certain parties had cost him trouble enough
already. Besides, really, she must see that his position between her
husband, whom he respected, and a certain other party was a delicate
one. But Mrs. Bunker heard no more. She turned and ran down the
staircase, carrying with her a burning cheek and blazing eye that
somewhat startled the complacent official.

She did not remember how she got home again. She had a vague
recollection of passing through the crowded streets, wondering if the
people knew that she was an outcast, deserted by her husband, deceived
by her ideal hero, repudiated by her friends! Men had gathered in
knots before the newspaper offices, excited and gesticulating over the
bulletin boards that had such strange legends as "The Crisis," "Details
of an Alleged Conspiracy to Overthrow the Government," "The Assassin of
Henderson to the Fore Again," "Rumored Arrests on the Mexican Frontier."
Sometimes she thought she understood the drift of them; even fancied
they were the outcome of her visit--as if her very presence carried
treachery and suspicion with it--but generally they only struck her
benumbed sense as a dull, meaningless echo of something that had
happened long ago. When she reached her house, late that night, the
familiar solitude of shore and sea gave her a momentary relief, but with
it came the terrible conviction that she had forfeited her right to it,
that when her husband came back it would be hers no longer, and that
with their meeting she would know it no more. For through all her
childish vacillation and imaginings she managed to cling to one
ste