A voice, low and soft but sweeter than a breath from Cathay reached his ears and set the music throbbing in his heart. "Senor Roderic--_hola_, it is I!" "God bless you--I am here within reach. Hold steady and let me touch you, lest I believe I am only dreaming, my darling." And he immediately held her little loyal form within the shelter of his arms, though when he rained burning kisses on her lips she struggled to be free. "This is no time for that. Holy mother, what a rude man you are, Senor Roderic. Release me, I beg, I command. Remember he must win who wears. You have a duty to perform." "Which shall be accomplished with Heaven's help. But I thought you were gone, sweetheart?" "We are just starting--the cart is at the door, and uncle is waiting." "Then he knows why you return?" "Yes. He made only one stipulation." "What is it?" "Your promise not to move a hand until dawn, to prevent our sailing on the Sterling Castle." Roderic breathed easier. "Tell the dear old governor I give that most willingly. You know I leave here myself in a comparatively few hours." "Then I must go." "You leave me--we may never meet again." "The Virgin watch over you," she faltered. "Will you go without one parting embrace--ah! the world is wide and danger lurks everywhere when people are at war. One kiss sweetheart, of your own free will--it may be a talisman to guard me against evil." He pleaded not in vain. A pair of soft arms were thrown around his neck, and not one but a dozen kisses rained upon his lips--then when he would have sought to detain her she eluded his grasp and flitted away in the dark, her gentle "adios, beloved," sounding like a benediction to his ravished ears. A few minutes later he heard the roll of wheels, as the jaunting car took them to the distant quay. "She is gone, Heaven bless her," he muttered--"lucky man that I am, thrice blessed to be beloved by two such charming creatures; to me there is only one who can fill the longing of my heart and she has just left me." And this was the reason Roderic turned up at the Shelbourne late that night looking like a man who had supped with adventure. CHAPTER IX. DOWN THE IRISH COAST. When Roderic Owen saw the look of deep concern on his cousin's face give way to a radiant expression as he entered the door of the hotel, his heart reproached him. Here he had been actually reveling in the realms of bliss for the last three hours or more, while Cleo, judging from her appearance, had been "plunged in a gulf of dark despair," or at least considerably worried over the fact of his singular disappearance. It was really too bad. Her faithful heart had yearned after him, just as a loving sister's might for the absent one--the two girls were so entirely unlike in looks and temperament that it never occurred to him to compare Cleo's affection with that of Georgia--and yet it was of the kind that lasts through life.