'This isn't New York,' he reminded her. 'But that man is a perfect devil,' she persisted earnestly. 'He is a professional murderer. He has no feeling, no mercy, and he is so cunning. And behind him there is Kessner and all his millions.' Lavendale shrugged his shoulders. 'All the millions that were ever owned,' he said, 'wouldn't help a man over here against the law. I am not afraid of Courlander. There is nothing he could try which I am not prepared for, and if it comes to a hand-to-hand struggle, I don't think I have anything to fear from him.' 'I don't like it,' she told him frankly. 'You will be on your guard, won't you?' His voice softened. 'Of course I will, but, Miss de Freyne--Suzanne--why don't you like it? Why do you worry about me at all?' She was silent for a moment. She had turned a little towards the window, her eyes had lost their usual directness. He took a step forward. 'It isn't because you care a little about me, by any chance, is it?' he asked. She gave him her hand. Then she turned around and he saw that her eyes were soft with tears. 'Suzanne!' he faltered. She turned towards him. There was something very sweet about her little gesture, something yielding and yet restraining. 'Won't you please forget all this for just a little time?' she pleaded. 'To tell you the truth, I feel almost like a traitress when I even let myself think of such things now that my country is in such agony, when everything that is dear to me in life seems imperilled. You have your work, too, and I have mine. Perhaps the end may be happy.' He raised her fingers to his lips and kissed them. 'I will obey,' he promised, turning towards the door. 'And you will be careful--please be careful,' she begged, as she let him out and squeezed his arm for a moment. 'There! Now you must go to your dinner. You look very nice, and I am sure you will sit next some one altogether charming, and perhaps you will forget. But I shall like to think of this evening.' ... Practical, hard-headed, and with a sound hold upon the every-day episodes of life, Lavendale nevertheless passed through the remainder of that evening with his head in the clouds. He was vaguely conscious of the other twenty-three guests who shared with him the hospitality of the Ambassador--a few diplomats, a professor from Harvard University and his wife, two other distinguished Americans, with a sprinkling of their English connections. He sat next a distant relative of his own, an American girl who had married an Englishman, and his abstraction was perhaps ministered to by the fact that conversation from him was entirely unlooked for. In the reception rooms afterwards he found himself able to speak for a moment with Washburn. 'Have you seen anything of Mr. Kessner?' he asked. The other made a little grimace. 'Very little,' he replied. 'The Chief and he don't exactly hit it off. I heard a rumour the other day that he might be going back to Germany.'