Politeness forbade that they should talk all the time to each other during that enchanted meal. Mr. Ellis was at the other side of Miss Pridmore, and an unknown lady of great charm and volubility was at the other side of Mr. Harper. These very agreeable people had to have a little share of their conversation, but during the major part of a delightful affair, Henry Harper was talking as he had never talked in his life before, not even to Klondyke himself, to Klondyke's sister.

It was not only about Klondyke that they talked. They had other things in common. Miss Pridmore was a perfectly sincere, a frankly outspoken admirer of "The Adventures of Dick Smith." She had never read anything like it; moreover she was quite fearless and nobly unqualified in her admiration of that fascinating tale of adventure, for the most part murderous adventure, on the high seas.

"We all have great arguments at home," she said, "as to which volume is the best. I say the first. To me those island chapters are incomparable. The Island of San Pedro. I say that's better than 'Robinson Crusoe' itself, which makes Uncle George furious. He considers it sacrilege to say anything of the kind."

"It is so," said the author with a little quiver of happiness.

"But you are bound to say that, aren't you?"

"I wouldn't say it if I didn't think it, Miss Pridmore."

The quaint solemnity delighted her.

"Uncle George says the Island of San Pedro is an imitation of 'Robinson Crusoe,' but nothing will ever make me admit that, so you had better not admit it either. Please say it isn't, to save my reputation for omniscience."

"I had not read 'Robinson Crusoe' when I wrote the Island, and I suppose if I had I should have written it differently."

"It's a very good thing you hadn't. There's nothing like the Island anywhere to my mind. You can see and feel and hear and smell and taste that Island. It is so real that when poor Dick was put ashore by the drunken captain of the brigantine Excelsior I literally daren't go to bed. And my brother Jack says – and I always quote this to Uncle George – that no more lifelike picture of a windjammer – it is a windjammer, isn't it? – "

"That's right."

"And of an island in the Pacific could possibly be given."

"Well, I wouldn't quite say that myself," said the sailorman, with the blood singing in his ears.

"Of course not. It wouldn't be right for you to say it."

"Where is Klondyke now, Miss Pridmore?" he asked suddenly.

"No one knows. He probably doesn't know himself. The last letter my mother had from him arrived about two months ago. He was then in the middle of Abyssinia. But he has moved since. He never stays long anywhere when the wanderlust is on him. But we don't worry. He'll turn up one of these days quite unexpectedly, looking rather like a tramp, and will settle down to civilization for a short time; and then one morning he'll go off again to the most outlandish place he can think of, and we may not see or hear anything of him for months or even years."

A dull period followed the dessert. Miss Pridmore and the other ladies went and the Sailor had to remain with four comparatively flat and tame gentlemen who smoked very good cigars and talked of matters which the young man did not feel competent to enter upon.

It was an irksome twenty minutes, but it had to be endured. And it was not really so very difficult because he was in heaven.

At last when the four other gentlemen had solemnly smoked their cigars, and he had smoked the mild cigarette which contented him, they went upstairs. And as they did so he felt the hand of Edward Ambrose on his shoulder and he heard a laughing voice in his ear. "Henry, you are going great guns."

That was quite true. He felt wonderful. There is no doubt people do feel wonderful when they are in heaven. And there was his divinity sitting in the middle of the smaller sofa, and as soon as he entered he was summoned with a gesture of charming imperiousness which the boldest of men would not have dared to disobey. And as he came to her she laughingly made room for him. He sat by her side and fell at once to talking again of Klondyke. From Klondyke, whom she would not admit was quite the hero the author of "Dick Smith" considered him to be, they passed to the High Seas, and then to Literature, and then to the Drama, and then to Life itself, and then to the High Seas again, and then to Edward Ambrose, whom she spoke of with great affection as a very old friend of hers and of her family, and then once more to Life itself. After the flight of a winged hour she rose suddenly and held out her hand. But as she did so she also said one memorable thing.

"Mr. Harper" – her fingers were touching his – "promise, please, you will come to tea one afternoon soon. No. 50, Queen Street, Mayfair. I am going to write it on a piece of paper if you will get it for me, so that there will be no mistake."

The Sailor got the piece of paper for Miss Pridmore. As he did so the eternal feminine rejoiced at his tall, straight, cleanly handsomeness, in spite of the reach-me-down which clothed it.

"Now that means no excuse," she said, with a little touch of royal imperiousness returning upon her. "No. 50, Queen Street. One of those little houses on the left. About half past four. Shall we say Wednesday? I want to hear you talk to my mother about Klondyke."

She gave him her hand again, and then after a number of very cordial and direct good-bys which Klondyke himself could not have bettered, she went downstairs gayly with her host.

"Tell me, Mary," said Edward Ambrose on the way down, "who in the world is Klondyke?"

"It's Jack," she said. "They were together on board the brigantine Excelsior– although that's not the real name of it."

"How odd!" said Edward Ambrose. "But what a fellow he is not to have said so. When one remembers how he gloated over the yarn one would have thought – "

"But how should he know? It must have been years ago. Yet the strange thing is he remembers Jack and he knew I was his sister because we are so exactly alike, which I thought very tactless."

"Naturally. Did you like him?" The question came with very swift directness.

"He's amazing." The answer was equally swift, equally direct. "He is the only author I have ever met who comes near to being – "

"To being what?" Mary Pridmore had suddenly remembered that she was being escorted downstairs by a distinguished man of letters.

"Do you press the question?"

"Certainly I press the question."

"Very well, then," said Mary Pridmore. "Wild horses will not make me answer it. But I can only say that your young man is as wonderful as his books. He's coming to tea on Wednesday, and it will be very disappointing if you don't come as well. Good-by, Edward. It's been a splendid evening." And she waved her hand to him as she sped away with an air of large and heroic enjoyment of the universe, while Edward Ambrose stood rather wistfully at the door watching her recede into the night.

III

"My friend," said Edward Ambrose, as he helped the last departing guest into his overcoat, "I suppose you know you have made a conquest?"

The Sailor was not aware of the fact.

"Mary Pridmore is … well, she is rather … she is rather…"

"We talked a lot," said the young man, with a glow in his voice. "I hope she wasn't bored. But as she was Klondyke's sister, I couldn't help letting myself go a bit. She's – she's just my idea of what a lady ought to be."

The young man, who was still in heaven, had the grace to blush at such an indiscretion. His host laughed.

Said he: "Had I realized that you were such a very dangerous fellow, I don't think you would have been invited here tonight. I mean it, Henry." And to show that he didn't mean it in the least, Edward Ambrose gave the Sailor a little affectionate push into Bury Street.

As the night was fine and time was his own, Henry Harper returned on foot to King John's Mansions. He did not go by a direct route, but chose Regent Street, Marylebone Road, Euston Road, and other circuitous thoroughfares, so that the journey took about four times as long as it need have done. Midnight had struck already when he came to the top of the Avenue.

By that time he was no longer in heaven. As a matter of fact, he had fallen out of paradise in Portland Place. It was there he suddenly remembered Cora. For several enchanted hours he had completely forgotten her. He had been in Elysium, but almost opposite the Queen's Hall he fell out of it. It was there the unwelcome truth came upon him that he had been surrendering himself to madness.

He clenched his teeth as if he had received a blow in the face. He was like an ill-found ship wrenched from its moorings and cast adrift in mid-ocean. God in heaven, how was he to go home to that unspeakable woman after such a draught of sheer delight!

For a moment, standing dazed and breathless in the middle of the road, he almost wanted to shriek. He had been drinking champagne, not with undignified freedom, yet for unseasoned temperaments it may be a dangerous beverage even in modest quantities. He had really drunk very little, but he felt that in the situation he had now to face it would have been better to have left it alone.

How was he going to face Cora now he had seen the péri, now he had looked within the Enchanted Gates?

There was only one possible answer to the question. And that had come to him as he had crossed, quite unnecessarily, the Marylebone Road, and had fetched up against the railings of Regent's Park. He must accept the issue like a man. Setting his teeth anew, he moved in an easterly direction towards the Euston Road.

He allowed himself to hope, as he turned the latchkey in the door of No. 106, King John's Mansions, that Cora had not carried out her threat. But he was not able to build much upon it. As he climbed up slowly towards the roof of the flats there seemed something indescribably squalid about the endless flights of bleak, iron-railed stone stairs.

When the door of No. 106 opened to his latchkey, the first thing he perceived was a stealthy reek of alcohol. A light was in the passage; and then as he closed the outer door, he caught an oddly unexpected sound of voices coming through the half open door of the sitting-room. He stood and listened tensely. One of the voices was that of a man.

It was not necessary to enter the sitting-room itself to confirm this fact. A man's hat, one of the sort called a gibus, which he knew was only worn with evening clothes, was hanging on one of the pegs in the passage. An overcoat lined with astrachan was under it.

He could hear a strange voice coming from the sitting-room. It was that of a man of education, but it had a sort of huskiness which betrayed the familiar presence of alcohol. Involuntarily, he stood to listen at the half open door.

"Cora, old girl, you are as tight as a tick." After all, the tones were more, sober than drunk. "I'll be getting a move on, I think. I'll soon be as bad as you, and then I won't be able to, I expect."

"Don't go yet, ducky. I am just beginning to like you." It was the voice of Cora – the voice of Cora drunk.

"I will, if you don't mind. That second bottle has been a mistake. And you are not so very amusing, are you?"

"Speak for yourself." And the voice of Cora subsided into some far and deep oblivion.

There was a silence. In the midst of it, the young man suddenly entered the room.

The visitor, who was tall and powerful and well dressed, had the look of a gentleman. Perhaps a gentleman run a little to seed. He was standing on the threadbare hearthrug, his hands in his pockets, in a rather contemptuous attitude, while Cora, unmistakably drunk, had subsided on the sofa. Several bottles with glasses beside them were on the table.

As Henry Harper entered the room, the man looked at him in utter astonishment. His surprise seemed too great to allow him to speak.

"'Ullo, Harry," muttered Cora from her sofa. She did not attempt a more formal or coherent greeting.

He did not know what to say or how to act. He was wholly taken aback by the man's air of cool surprise; indeed his attitude expressed grim resentment for the intrusion of a third person.

"Who is this gentleman, Cora?" at last the young man was able to ask.

"Go to hell," Cora muttered.

"Yes, go to hell," said the man, apparently grateful for the lead.

Harper stood nonplused, defeated. But he managed to say, feebly enough as it seemed to himself, "I don't know who you are, sir, but I'll thank you for an explanation."

The man laughed insolently. "It's the limit," he said.

At this point, Cora, by an effort verging upon the superhuman, sat up on the sofa.

"Charlie." Her voice was a wheeze. "I want you to set about this beauty – to oblige me."

"My God, I've a good mind to," said Charlie, who as he became more sober seemed to grow more dangerous. "I don't know who you are, my friend, but if you'll take advice you'll clear out."

As the man spoke, his eyes looked particularly ugly. But among the things the Sailor had learned aboard the Margaret Carey was the art of keeping cool in a crisis.

"You've no right here at all, sir," said the man. "You ought to know that."

"No right!" said Henry Harper, in astonishment.

"If you are a wise man, you will go away. I was here first."

"What do you mean?"

"I came at the invitation of this lady, Miss Cora Dobbs, who is a very old friend of mine."

The man turned towards the sofa. Cora nodded. But she was now bordering on a state of coma.

"Who are you, sir?" Harper tried hard to keep his temper in spite of the man's calculated insolence. "Are you a relation of hers?"

"A relation!" The man was taken aback. "We are both here for the same object, I presume."

"I don't know what you mean, but this is my flat and I'll be very thankful if you'll quit."

"Your flat!" A light seemed to dawn. The man turned to Cora: "Why didn't you tell me? I thought you were on your own, as you were before I went to Canada."

To the man's clear annoyance, Cora had now reached a phase which forbade her to answer this question. He then addressed Henry Harper with a sudden change of voice.

"She's not played the game," he said, half apologetically.

"I don't know what you mean by that. I don't understand you."

The man looked at him in astonishment. He then looked at Cora, who was half lying upon the sofa, mute, fuddled, and indifferent.

"Come outside," said the man, in a lower tone, "and I'll explain."

Feeling completely bewildered, Harper accompanied him into the passage.

"I apologize," said the man, as soon as they got there. "But Cora is entirely to blame. There's no need to say she never told me she was living with you."

"I don't understand," said Henry Harper.

The man stared at him. He was at a loss.

"Of course, I've known Cora Dobbs for years." He lowered his voice. "But I've been away in Canada. Before I went, I used to come here pretty regularly."

As the man spoke, light came to Henry Harper. All at once, a chill ran in his veins.

"But … but she's … she's my wife," he gasped, leaning heavily against the wall of the passage.

"She's your what!" the man almost shouted.

"She's my wife."

Again the man stared at him, but now with a look of consternation and pity.

"You mean to say you didn't know?"

The young man, still leaning against the wall, was unable to speak. A glance at the ashen face convinced the older man that there was no need to repeat the question.

"Well, I'm sorry, and I can only apologize," he said, after a moment's pause, and in a tone of good feeling. He then took his hat and coat from the peg, and suddenly darted out of the flat. The door closed after him with a bang.

IV

The Sailor continued to lean against the wall. An abyss had opened. The look on the face of Mr. Rudge, his late master, and the strange words he had used were returning upon him with awful force.

With this discovery came surprise, bewilderment, self-disgust. It hardly seemed possible that a man in his senses could be so blind, so ignorant, so gullible. Where had been his wits, that he should have allowed the creature at the other side of the passage wall, and her associates, to dupe him so completely?

As the feeling of amazement at his own folly deepened, a gust of fury swept through him like a storm. An overmastering desire came upon him to enter that room, to deal once and for all with this bird of prey. Let the world be rid of a foul thing. Let his be the hand to efface it in its infamy.

He would go in at once and make an end of her. A surge of inherited forces, a flood of old, unhappy, far-off things were whirling him like a piece of driftwood into the maëlstrom. He was in the grip of a terrible power … a power beyond his control. It was not merely that she had entrapped him, or that he had been incredibly blind to the drab and sordid world in which she lived; in the light of a widening knowledge, the fact which now drove him to frenzy was that a creature so common and unclean should have found it so easy to make him her victim.

He did not return to the room at once. There were other forces, it seemed, vibrating in the air around him. There came a sudden reminder from the talisman that he bore continually in the right-hand corner of his brain. He heard a voice.

"Henry Harper, is she worth it? Remember, if you destroy her, you destroy yourself utterly, body and soul."

The words sank into him. The issue was joined, and there came the shock of battle. A will half wrenched asunder seemed about to be overthrown. The desire to enter the room was overmastering; a sense of duty was reinforced by the passion of revenge. There was madness in the thought that he was the dupe of a common woman of the streets.

Shaken with a fury that was awful, he still leaned against the wall of the passage. The voice of the genie was no longer heard. The talisman shone no more. The old, unhappy, far-off things had overwhelmed them.

"Kill her, kill her," they whispered savagely. "It is the only thing to do."

He was half down already. The forces of destiny were crushing out his life.

"Kill her. Kill her." The very walls were breathing commands in his ears. "It is a duty to others to avenge yourself."

There was subtlety in the demand. But this was a strong, not a subtle nature. It did not practice self-deception lightly. Aladdin's lamp was quick to reveal the sophist; moreover, it had its own answer ready. Suddenly it flashed before the mind of Henry Harper the elemental figure of the man James Thorneycroft simply relating his story. By a curious trick of the brain, the words of the condemned man were again in his ears.

"You can take it from me that there is a God."

He hardly knew what those words meant even as he heard them now. But he knew they had a significance beyond any which had previously touched his life. Then a miracle happened. The powers which had him in their grip began to relax. It was as if his whole being was translated. He was again his own man. Broken and shattered he was able to stagger to his own room and light the gas.

The battle was not decided yet. But a new power had come to him. Therefore Henry Harper's first act was to do that which he had never done before in his life. He kneeled by the side of his bed and prayed.

Presently he rose, and went out again into the little lobby, past the half open door through which could be heard a succession of drunken snores. He snatched his coat and hat from the peg and went hurriedly down into the street.

It was one o'clock. The Avenue and its environs were almost deserted, save for an occasional policeman and a few returning revelers. He had no idea as to the way he should go. His one desire was to get as far as he could from King John's Mansions in the shortest possible time.

Walking about the streets of the city hour after hour, he could not measure the abyss which had engulfed him. He was completely cast away, he had lost track of himself, he didn't know where he was, he had no chart by which to go.

Ceaseless wandering through remote and unknown places brought the dawn at last, and then he found that the spot he had reached was Camberwell Green. Overcome with fatigue, he sat on a public seat near a tram terminus for a little while. Then he tried to shape his thoughts, but the mind refused to act.