“He told me himself,” she answered with a smile and the hint of a blush. “I crossed from America with him the time he was arrested at Queenstown for the bond robbery, and--well, we got acquainted. Of course, nobody knew who he was.” A torrent of questions overwhelmed Mrs Pryce. She had achieved fame--she had known the hero of the last great jewel robbery. She spoke of him from first-hand knowledge. The unrivalled attraction of crime--crime in the grand manner--fascinates us all. But she wouldn’t say much. “He was just an acquaintance for the voyage,” she told us; “though, of course, it was rather a shock when he was arrested at Queenstown.” “Oh, what a surprise!” exclaimed Charlie Pryce jovially. “A surprise?” She seemed to me to start ever so little. “Oh yes, of course--terrible!” she went on the next instant. “Was he nice?” asked our hostess. “Yes, he was very--very attractive,” she answered. And somehow I fancy her glance rested for a moment on her husband--indeed on a particular portion of him. Charlie was just lighting the after-lunch cigarette. Charlie’s hands--he is a very good fellow and well off--are decidedly red and particularly podgy. II I liked Mrs Pryce very much. She was pretty, dainty, bright, and--well, bachelors are so apt to think that pretty married women have a dull time at home that I will lay no stress on my own private opinion as to her domestic lot. Enough that I was always glad to talk with her, and that it was pleasant to walk with her in the Major’s quiet old garden on a fine night when the wind stirred the boughs and the moon shone. Inside they had taken to pool--and whisky-and-soda. I play the former badly, and take the latter when the evening is more advanced. “Beautiful moon!” I observed, enjoying Nature, my company, and my cigar. She was silent a moment. Then she said: “It shone just like that the third night out from New York.” “Your last trip?” She crosses pretty often, as Charlie has business connections on the other side. “No. The one when--the one we were talking about at lunch.” “Ah! When our friend of the slim fingers----?” “Yes.” “Let’s sit down,” I suggested. We were just passing a garden seat. She smiled at me half sadly, half mockingly. She saw through me; she knew I wanted to hear more about it. By some sort of sympathy I knew that she wanted to talk about it. It was queer, too, to consider through what window that moon was shining on Slim-Fingered Jim. Did it--and his other surroundings--remind him of the broad Atlantic? “The risks of the profession, gentlemen!” “Yes, he had beautiful hands,” she murmured. “What’ll they look like when----?” She caught my hand sharply in hers. “Hush, hush!” she whispered. I felt ashamed of myself, but of course I couldn’t have known that--well, that she’d feel it like that.