“Yes, it was really too bad that John Dinsmore turned out to be poor!” she sighed. “He had such a noble bearing, and the head of a king, with a heart as generous, chivalrous and kind as a woman; just such a man as the heroes were in all the books I have read. I hardly think that he is the sort of man to do anything rash, because of my refusal of him--commit suicide, or anything as terrible as that. I could not say the same thing concerning Ray Challoner. Had I said him nay, I am confident that he would have kept his word--that they would have found his body on the sands when the morrow should break, with a bullet wound in his brain; mutely telling the story of his sad taking off.” And the thought of handsome, dashing, debonair Raymond Challoner lying white and lifeless on the beach, and all for love of her, was a gloomy picture which she did not care to dwell upon. Aside from his enormously reported wealth and splendid appearance, the fact that every marriageable girl at Newport had been head over heels in love with him, and would gladly have been his for the asking, had made him a very desirable _parti_ in Queenie Trevalyn’s covetous eyes. In fact, she had been quite live with him until the dark, gloomy, mysterious stranger, whom Newport had known only as Mr. Dinsmore, came upon the scene. The next morning Queenie heard that Mr. Dinsmore had left the hotel the night before; none seemed to know whence he had gone; he had disappeared as suddenly as he had come. The fact was, the affair of honor had been kept so profound a secret that even the hotel people had not learned of it, and would certainly have kept it to themselves if they had, being too wise to bruit the sensational story about. Raymond Challoner appeared at the breakfast table as bright, smiling and gay as usual. He had not seen the doctor as yet, to ascertain the extent of his adversary’s injuries; or, indeed, whether or not his aim had proven fatal; nor did he allow the little affair to trouble him in the least. He did not give it a single thought; it had not cost him an anxious moment, or one hour’s loss of sleep. At his plate he found a dainty note from his _fiancée_ awaiting him. Would he join her on the east veranda at ten, that morning, she asked. She had something very particular to tell him. At ten promptly Raymond Challoner appeared at the place of rendezvous, smiling and debonair, with a white rose in his buttonhole. Queenie Trevalyn was waiting for him at the other end of the veranda, quite as lovely a picture of girlhood as man’s eyes had ever rested upon. CHAPTER VI. A MAN’S FICKLE HEART. “Do not, as some ungracious rascals do, Show me the steep and thorny way to heaven; While like a puffed and reckless libertine, Himself the primrose path of dalliance treads.”