But at least she could remember nearly every word of their exchange that afternoon, and a soft smile curved her lips. Yes, she loved him--loved him with all her heart and every atom of her being.... But her smile was not of motherly affection. (God help the man who inspires that watery form of love!) It was a smile of pride, of clean, wholesome, exuberant joy that he was hers and she his. He was so fine, so sunny, so eminently sane and vital, so masterful--and yet without any artificial, self-conscious, diluted, drawing-room, flapper-thrilling, synthetic-cavemanishness about him--so dynamic, so fresh and savoury--both intellectually and physically.... And she was going to marry him. That pride she felt whenever she was with him was to be hers always.... And so, after moments of delicious day-dreaming, her fantasy carried her reluctantly to his immediate work--the Alpha Triangle. When would the menace of that dread organisation be lifted from the city? What was the secret of the Apex, that secret which if broadcast would mean the lightening of the shadow which loomed over London--the secret to preserve which the Apex was prepared for murder? The thought recalled to her his threat to have her arrested unless she married him that day. She had believed at first that he was joking. The idea was too preposterous.... And yet, was anything preposterous in those days, when a gang of killers such as one expects to encounter only in the pages of the sensational novelist were trying to blackmail the Centre of the World to the tune of fifteen million pounds sterling--and were, moreover, almost daily giving convincing evidence of their mercilessness and their ability to carry out every threat they made? But why arrest her? The answer was easy: that she might be more efficiently guarded than she could be in a private house. And the alternative, marriage to Storm, would make her nearly as secure. But the day he had given her for making up her mind had gone by, and she had not married him--he had left the choice open to her as if he expected her to ring him up and say: "Kit, old man, I've changed my mind. D'you think you could spare the time to drop into a registry office with me this afternoon?" Everything that was romantic in her revolted from the cold-bloodedness of the idea. It was unthinkable, and yet there had been a substratum of seriousness underlying his light tone. What was the second condition? "_If a certain gentleman now in custody escapes..._" Of course--but no; even that didn't exceed the bounds of possibility, when already the Triangle had rescued thirteen of its members from the Flying Squad van in which they were being hustled to a police station. Who was this man who might escape? And what was his particular importance? She had no data for the solution of that problem, and branched from it on to another tack.