"If I could but hope that!" she said. "And yet," she added, recklessly, "why should I care what I say?"
"To be sure," agreed Tourmalin at random, "why should you, you know?"
"You must have seen from the first that I was very far from being happy?"
"I must confess," said Peter, with the air of a man whom nothing escaped, "that I did observe that."
"And you were right! Was it unnatural that I should be nothing but grateful to the chance which first brought us together?"
"Not at all," said Peter, delighted to feel himself on solid ground again; "indeed, if I may speak for myself, I have even greater reason to feel grateful to that monkey."
"To what monkey?" she exclaimed.
"Why, naturally, my dear Miss Tyrrell, to the animal which was the unconscious instrument in making us acquainted. You surely cannot have forgotten already that it was a monkey?"
She half rose with an impetuous movement, the mantilla fell from her face, and, even in the faint starlight, he could perceive that, beau-
