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“Will you give me a dance, Mrs. Perceval?”

She looked up at him, meeting his eyes with an effort.

“I am not dancing,” she said.

“Just one,” he pleaded, with that air of gallantry that cloaked she knew not what.

She hesitated, and then, almost in spite of herself, with something of the old regal graciousness, she yielded.

“Just one, then, Major Hone, since to-morrow it will be good-bye.”

He thanked her with a deep bow, and promptly led her away.

They danced the first waltz together in unbroken silence. Nina kept her face studiously turned over her shoulder. Not once did she glance at her partner, whose quiet dancing and steady arm told her nothing.

When it was over, he led her to a seat in full view of the other dancers, and sat down beside her. For a few seconds he maintained his silence, then quietly he turned and spoke.

“Are you going to stay in London?”

The direct question surprised her. Somehow, though he had given her small reason to do so, she had come to expect naught but subtle strategy from him.

“I shall spend one night there,” she said, after a moment’s thought.

“No longer?”

She faced him calmly, though her heart had begun to leap and race within her.

“Why do you ask?”

“Why don’t you answer?” said Hone.

He was smiling faintly, but there was determination in the set of his jaw.

“Because,” she said slowly, “I am not sure that I want you to know.”

“Why not?” said Hone. She shook her head in silence. “It’s sorry I am to hear it,” he said, after a brief pause. “For if it’s to be a game of hide-and-seek I shall soon run you to earth.”

She raised her eyebrows. Had they been alone together she knew that she could not have disguised her fear. It had grown upon her marvellously of late. But the publicity of their intercourse endued her with a certain courage.

“What is it that you want of me?” she said.

He met her eyes with absolute steadiness.

“I will tell you,” he said, “the next time we meet.”

She tried to laugh to hide the wild tumult his words stirred up.

“Is that a promise?”

“My solemn bond,” said Hone.

She rose.

“I shall stay at the Seton Ward Hotel for a week,” she said. “Good-night!”

He rose also; they stood for a moment face to face.

“Alone?” he asked.

And again, with a reckless sense of throwing herself upon his mercy, she made brief reply.

“I haven’t a friend in the world.”

He gave her his arm.

“Any enemies?” he asked.

They were at the door before she answered.

“Yes–one.”

For an instant his arm grew tense, detaining her.

“And that?” he questioned.

She withdrew her hand sharply.

“Myself,” she said, and swiftly, without another glance, she left him.

XIII

The roar of the London traffic rose muffled through the London fog. It was a winter afternoon of great murkiness.

In the private sitting-room of a private hotel Nina Perceval sat alone, as she had sat for two dragging, intolerable days, and waited. She had begun to ask herself–she had asked herself many times that day–if she waited in vain. She would remain for the week, whatever happened, but the torture of suspense had become such as she scarcely knew how to endure. Something of the fever of restlessness that had tormented her at Bombay was upon her now, but with it, subtly mingled, was a misery of uncertainty that had not gripped her then. She was unspeakably lonely, and at certain panic-stricken times unspeakably afraid; but whether it was the possibility of his presence or the certainty of his continued absence that appalled her, she could not have said.

A fire burned with a cheery crackling in the room, throwing weird shadows through the dimness. Yet she shivered from time to time as though the chill of the London fog penetrated to her bones. Ah! what was that? She startled violently at the sound of a low knock at the door, then hastily commanded herself. It was only a waiter with the tea she had ordered, of course. With her back to the door she bade him enter.