Neither spoke as the car sped them to the hangar. It was dark, unoccupied. Potter unlocked the door and threw it open for Hildegarde to enter. In an instant he found the switch and turned on the lights.... Before them brooded Potter's newest aeroplane, wings spread as though something found shelter beneath them. Hildegarde spoke of that. "Like a mother chicken," she said, pointing, "protecting her brood.... What a brood she is protecting to-night!" "You must help," he said, sharply. "Throw off your coat." She did so, stood revealed as she had stood revealed that other day, that bountiful spring day. Potter shut his eyes. "Why?" he said, "why--" She did not answer, and he stood, eyes open now, staring at her. His lips were white, straight, compressed. His throat ached.... How could that thing be true which she had confessed?... Every line of her proclaimed it a lie. The slenderness, the grace, the piquancy and boyish beauty of her asserted her purity, her chastity. He groaned.... They lied. In her nature had created a lie.... He tore away his eyes, began to work with feverish energy, ordering Hildegarde here, ordering her there, and she obeyed quietly, intelligently. Potter tested struts and braces, wires and fastenings, controls and motor. He saw to it there were gasolene and lubricant--as far as was in his power he saw to it that his steed of the air should be at its best, potent to give the most that could be demanded of it that night. He looked at his watch. "Nearly ten," he said. "Is it time to start?" "Yes." "What will you do? How will you find him?" "I'll sit down on the road he must follow," Potter said. "I'll blockade his island. He won't get past me." "In the darkness--" He pointed through the window. The moon had arisen, silver-cold, gleaming with the rays of a frozen fire. "Potter--" "Yes." "I'm going with you.... That is why I wore these clothes." "Nonsense!" he said, sharply. "I've got to buy myself free," she said, intensely. "Can't you understand?... I've done wrong.... I was almost a traitor to my country--that I _loved_. I knew, and I was afraid to tell. I knew her enemies and her traitors--and I knew what they were attempting to do--but I was afraid to tell.... But I _did_ tell, when it was almost too late.... I'm guilty, Potter. It will be with me always, accusing me, if you don't let me go.... You must see.... There'll be danger to-night. I must be in danger. I must risk something, everything. I must show that I am willing to die for my country.... Don't you understand now? I must be willing to offer myself--and I must offer myself.... It's a ransom.... Then I can come back--if I do come back--and go away and have _peace_." She stopped, drew nearer to him by a step, and let her eyes plead with him.