'Pardon me!' he said, recovering his breath, recovering his obstinacy, his dislike to coercion, 'I am not in the least sure that he would. Judging by this morning----' 'Then _she_ would--Lady Arbuthnot, I mean. And you--you are bound to do it for her-you know you are bound----' 'I?' he echoed again. 'Yes, you!' she repeated, and there was a quiver in her voice--'because you loved each other once. Oh! she didn't tell me--I have been learning a lot of things for myself lately, and I learned that because--but that is nothing! What I mean is, that it hurts her most, for she was wrong--quite wrong--she spoilt your life----' 'Perhaps I may be allowed to differ,' he began, stiffening himself again after his surprise; but she took no notice of his remark. Her face was troubled by her own thought--she was absorbed in it. 'It has come between you and everything, not the regret, but--I don't know what to call it quite--the value you have put upon it. And she has put it too. So you want to forget, and yet you don't. You think it so big a thing that it must be forgotten--made a fuss about. But it isn't. It isn't really part of one at all. I've learned that lately. And there is a better way'--she broke off, and came quite close to him, looking him in the face: 'not to forget, and yet not to care. Do this for her, Mr. Raymond, do it as you would do it for me?' Here, for the first time, a faint smile showed in her eyes, not on her lips. 'It is a funny thing for me to say, perhaps, but--but I gave you the _râm rucki_, didn't I? And so, no matter what else there is in the world that, perhaps, we can't help, I want you to do this for her and for me together, as you would for a man, as I would do it for a woman.' She laid her hand on his as she spoke, and held it there; not in a touch, but a clasp. 'And--and forget--whatever else there may be--always,' he asked steadily; 'forget for you both?' 'Please,' she replied quietly; 'for her and for me--always!' For an instant--one short instant--the man's instinctive recognition of woman's goodness and kindness--and of something else, perhaps, which had lain behind the appeal--made Jack Raymond feel as if he must kiss the hand that lay on his; then he laid his other one on it, returning the clasp. 'But how on earth is it to be done?' he said, frowning as they stood thus, like children playing a game; 'the office won't take it without authority--some one's name--' 'Couldn't you sent it from here--I can signal. I've learned--oh! such a lot of things that have never been of any real use, and--No! they keep the instrument locked, I know--that won't do! I'll forge the name--I could--and I don't mind.'