She turned towards the river and gazed at it, while her companion smoked. Already it seemed months since the other day when he and she had sat there and she had made him look at her with love. "I'm nearly certain that it has leaked out that Mr. Meramble didn't fall into the water," said Prudence, after a silence. "I suppose somebody must have been looking through a glass at us. People are always looking through a glass at the ocean and telling each other what they see. That man will do something, I tell you. He isn't smiling in such a shining way for nothing." "Very well; let us wait and see what he does. We shall have thus some interest in life left to us; that will be something for which to be grateful to your friend." "My friend!" "Certainly; and he may thank you for his ducking." Lawrence again puffed out a cloud of smoke and watched it dissipate in the blue air. But his wife refrained from speaking. A few more days passed. On one of them Prudence remarked that they had made a great mistake in leaving Europe; in Europe they wouldn't have met Mr. Meramble. "It might as well be Meramble as another; it was sure to be somebody," Lawrence returned. That afternoon a great many of the winter residents attended a tennis match. Of course Mr. and Mrs. Lawrence were there; so was Meramble; and just as the game was over this latter gentleman suddenly appeared near Lawrence, who was in the midst of a group of men and women. Meramble's face was crimson, and he was smiling. People looked at him curiously as he made his way among them. He carried a dog-whip in his hand; but then there was a bull-terrier at his heels, following closely, his red eyes watching his master. "How do you do, Mr. Lawrence?" Meramble asked. His voice was a trifle loud; but Lawrence spoke very low as he answered, distinctly, "How do you do, Mr. Meramble?" "Never was better in my life, thanks. I owe you one. Sometimes I have a fancy to pay my debts--as now." There was quite a theatrical air about the man as he spoke; indeed, his appearance usually savored of the melodrama. "Ah! That so?" said Lawrence, calmly. He was thinking, "That fellow knows that people know I flung him in." He had barely time to finish this thought when Meramble started forward and swung his dog-whip square across Lawrence's face. Lawrence felt a stinging blindness that confused him and made him reel for the instant. And he could not gather himself before something else had come upon him. Meramble's dog was at his throat; the brute had fastened himself there and was swinging by his hold. There was a rush, a shouting, a scramble of several men forward to get the dog off. Meramble stood back and looked on; he was still smiling with a glitter of black eyes and white teeth. Somebody got hold of the dog's legs. But somebody else was nearer still, and in the utter confusion in Lawrence's senses he yet heard a voice say, sharply, "No! no! His throat! His throat!"