e men as they argued and shouted
at each other in a polyglot of three different languages.

Arithelli felt more than a little resentful. Why had they shut her out
and prevented her from hearing their discussions?

The men at the other meetings had always wanted her in the room.

She had been entrusted with all their secrets and there was no question
of betrayal. She knew too much about the consequences now to try that.

When Emile came up from below she asked him why he had insulted her by
turning her out.

Did he not trust her, or did he think she had not enough intelligence.

For answer he laughed cynically, "I'll make use of you and your
intelligence fast enough--when I want them. You were cavilling at
being overworked the other day."

Of Vladimir and Paul she saw nothing in the daytime, for they both
ignored her, but in the evenings they all sat together up on deck, and
Paul sang and played the guitar while Arithelli would listen entranced
and faint with pleasure.

A love of melody was the birthright of her race, and the boy had a
genius for music. He seemed to have but two ideas in life--that, and a
devotion which almost amounted to idolatry for the older man.

They would walk up and down for hours, Vladimir with his hand on Paul's
shoulder talking, gesticulating and commanding, while the other, his
eyes on the ground, listened and assented.

Sometimes Vladimir would speak to him in Russian with an accent that
was in itself a caress, and Arithelli, who watched them curiously,
noticed and wondered to see the boy flush and colour like a woman.

She always looked forward with the keenest pleasure to those evenings.

The days bored her, inasmuch as she was capable of being bored, and she
hated the glare and glitter of the sun and sky.

It was too much like the blue-white lights of the Hippodrome. With
night came the glamour of Fairyland, that magic country in which
Ireland still believes, and which is ever there for those who seek it,
"East o' the Sun, and West o' the Moon."

The yacht drifting idly at anchor in smooth water, the stars in their
bed of velvet black, the magic of air and space.

The incense-like scent of Turkish cigarettes and black coffee, the
little group of men lounging in their deck chairs, the resonant, full
notes of the guitar, and Paul's voice rising out of the shadows.

If he had sung standing on the platform of a brightly lit concert hall
half the charm would have vanished