He had risen, and was just about to step forward, when he caught sight of Gerelda's face. The color of it held him spell-bound. It was as pale as death, and her eyes flashed fire. She was fairly frothing at the mouth, and the look of venomous rage that distorted her features appalled him. "You!" cried Gerelda. "Have you risen from the grave to confront me?" "I am Captain Frazier--at your service, madame," returned her companion, with a low bow. "As for my returning from the unknown shore, why, you flatter me in imagining that I have so much power, though I have been known to do some miraculous things before now. I am sorry that so many of my friends believe the ridiculous story that was set afloat regarding my supposed death. I am--" "Why are you here? What do you want?" cried Gerelda. "You are inclined to be brusque, my dear," he replied, tauntingly. "If you had asked me that question half an hour ago, I should have answered, 'I am here to stop your marriage with Hubert Varrick at whatever cost. I have traveled by night and by day, foot-sore and hungry, to get here in time to prevent it.' I-- I thought you had perished in the fire on the island, until I read the article in the paper announcing your marriage." "If this is all you have to say to me, permit me to say good-morning," she returned icily, turning to leave the place. "You shall listen to me!" he cried. "I vowed in days gone by that you should never be happy with Hubert Varrick. You promised that you would marry me, and those words changed my whole life." "Well, now that I am another's bride, what can you do about it?" sneered Gerelda. "I mean to see Varrick and have a little talk with him," he answered. "I will tell him how, on the very night before the marriage was to have taken place at the Crossmon Hotel, at Alexandria Bay, I threw myself on my knees at your feet, and cried out to you to spare me; that you had played with my heart too long, and urged you to fly with me, and that you said, while I knelt before you, that if you decided to fly with me you would let me know by sunrise the following morning, but that you must have all night to think it over. "Do you dare face me and deny that?" continued Captain Frazier, seizing her white wrist and holding it in an iron grip. "No, I do not deny it," she answered. "But what of it? What do you expect to make of it?" "This!" he cried, furiously. "I intend to be even with you. I will have a glorious revenge! I will see Hubert Varrick before he leaves this house, and say to him: 'I hope you may be happy with your bride,' and I will laugh in his face, crying out: 'She eloped with me not so very long ago, and we went to my island home, where we kept in hiding until the sensation should blow over. We remained there, as I can prove by all my servants, and I was a very slave to her sweet caprices.'"