Sallie\'s first startled impulse was to deny the new identity Slyne had so glibly bestowed on her. It seemed too preposterous to be believable; and she was very suspicious of him. A little flushed, more than a little afraid, and yet in some sense convinced in spite of herself by the outward and visible signs about her that all these strange happenings must have at least some foundation of fact, she sought to read the others\' thoughts in their faces.

The Marquis of Ingoldsby was gaping at her, in open wonder and admiration. Slyne\'s features wore a subdued expression of triumph, and Captain Dove\'s a dazed, incredulous frown. Mr. Jobling was beaming about him, so apparently satisfied with her, so respectably prosperous-looking himself that her doubts as to Slyne\'s good faith began to give way. When the lawyer was in turn presented to her and also addressed her by that new name, she could scarcely disclaim it.

"You\'ll stay and have luncheon with us, Lord Ingoldsby?" Slyne remarked, touching the bell; and his lordship left off gaping at Sallie to look him over with all the solemn sagacity of a young owl in broad daylight.

"Er—all right," his lordship at length agreed. "Don\'t mind if I do.

"Though I have some—er—friends waitin\' for me," he added as an afterthought, "that I promised to take for a run in your car, if—"

"You\'ll have time enough after lunch," Slyne suggested, and drew the noble marquis toward the window.

"The Marquis of Ingoldsby!" muttered Captain Dove. "A run in Slyne\'s car! And—Lady Josceline Justice!" He dug his knuckles forcibly into his blinking eyes, and, "I seem to be wide enough awake," said he in a stage aside as several waiters arrived on the scene.

While they were setting the table Sallie tried to collect her thoughts. Slyne had told her nothing till then, but that he had found out who her folk were. And she had come away from the Olive Branch blindly, only a little less distrustful of him than of Captain Dove\'s cruel intentions toward her if she had remained on board. Even now, she scarcely dared to believe—

In response to a sign from Slyne she took her place at the flower-decked table. The Marquis of Ingoldsby immediately settled himself at her side; he also was obviously a young man who knew what he wanted, and meant to have that at all hazards and, while the others were seating themselves, he ogled her killingly.

Slyne had sat down at her other hand, leaving Mr. Jobling and Captain Dove to keep one another company behind the great silver centre-piece which adorned the circular table. The marquis, leaning on one elbow, had turned his back on Mr. Jobling, and Slyne turned his on Captain Dove.

"This is a little bit of all right!" his lordship remarked to Sallie, with a confidential grin. "Only—I wish—How is it that we haven\'t met before, Lady Josephine? But never mind that. Let\'s be pals now. Shall we, eh?"

"I don\'t know," Sallie answered at random and since he seemed to expect some reply to that fatuity. She had met a good many men in her time, but never one quite like this Lord Ingoldsby—who actually seemed anxious to look and act like a cunning fool.

A waiter intervened between them. But his lordship waved that functionary away.

"Do let\'s," he implored with child-like insistence. "It would be so deevy to be pals with you. And I\'m beastly dull here, all by myself, don\'t y\'know. So—

"Eh?" He glared at Slyne, who had bluntly interrupted his tête-à-tête. "No, I don\'t want any oysters—I told that waiter-chap so. And I don\'t know any \'lady of the camellias.\' I can\'t imagine what you\'re talkin\' about at all, I\'m sure."

"I saw her again last night, at the Casino," said Slyne, imperturbably, and went on to entertain Sallie with a long if not over-truthful account of his own over-night\'s doings there. So that, for all his lordship\'s lack of manners, it was some time before that spoiled youth again succeeded in monopolising her attention. At every turn Slyne was ready to balk him, and, but for his native self-conceit coupled with a certain blind obstinacy, he must very soon have understood what was perfectly plain to Sallie, that he was there merely on sufferance, to serve some purpose of Slyne\'s.

"Goin\' to be here long, Lady Josephine?" he managed to break in at last. Slyne had turned to give a departing waiter some order.

"I don\'t know," Sallie answered again, since she could say nothing else.

"Hope to goodness you are," declared his lordship. "Stay for a week or two, anyhow: and,"—he lowered his voice to a husky whisper, leaning toward her—"let me trot you about a bit, eh? You\'ll maybe see more than enough of him by and by!" He indicated Slyne with an eloquent elbow, and further expressed his sentiments by means of an ardent sigh.

Beyond the blossom-laden épergne, Mr. Jobling and Captain Dove, almost cut off from other intercourse by that barrier, were exchanging coldly critical glances. Neither seemed to be quite at his ease with the other, and both had, of course, a great many urgent questions to put to Slyne as soon as the Marquis of Ingoldsby should be gone. So that the luncheon-party must have proved a very dull affair to them, and they were no doubt glad when it was over.

Slyne signalled to Sallie as soon as coffee was served, and she rose to leave the room. She was quite accustomed to being promptly dispensed with whenever her company might have been inconvenient.

"Oh, I say!" protested Lord Ingoldsby. "You\'re not goin\' yet, Lady J. Half a mo\'. Won\'t you come for a spin with me now that the car\'s mine? Just say the word and I\'ll drop my other engagement. And then we could dine at—"

"Lady Josceline will be engaged with her lawyer all afternoon," Slyne cut him short with the utmost coolness, "and she\'s leaving Monte Carlo again to-night."

The Marquis of Ingoldsby glowered at him.

"I\'ll see you in Paris, then, Lady J.," he went on, pointedly ignoring Slyne, "or in London, at least, later on. Well, good-bye—if you must be goin\'."

He bowed her out of the room, and then, snatching up his hat and cane with very visible annoyance, included the others in a curt nod of farewell and made off himself.

He passed her before she had closed her own door—and would gladly have paused there.

"You won\'t forget me, will you?" she heard him ask eagerly from behind her. But she did not delay to answer that question.

A few minutes later, Slyne knocked at her door and entered, followed by the other two men. He had brought with him the papers which Mr. Jobling had prepared. Mr. Jobling carried an inkstand, and Captain Dove a decanter of brandy. Slyne seated himself at the table and waved Sallie back to her chair by the window.

"We\'re going to talk business for a few minutes," he told her, "and then get everything settled in writing—to keep you safe.

"Fire ahead now, Dove. You want to know—"

"Is Sallie really—"

"I don\'t know anyone of that name now. D\'you mean Lady Josceline?"

Captain Dove glared at him, and then at the lawyer, and then at Sallie herself.

"Is that really who I am now, Jasper?" she asked, a most wistful inflection in her low voice.

"You needn\'t believe me," he answered her. "Ask Mr. Jobling. He\'ll tell you."

Mr. Jobling coughed importantly. "I\'ll tell you all I know myself, Lady Josceline," he promised her, and proceeded to repeat in part what he had told Slyne on the terrace the night before concerning the Jura family, but without a single word of the fortune awaiting the next of kin. Captain Dove\'s face expressed the extreme of astonishment as he too sat listening with the closest attention.

"That\'s as far as my present knowledge goes," the lawyer finished blandly. "And now—I understand that Captain Dove is prepared to supply the proof required in conclusion.

"How long have you known Lady Josceline, Captain Dove?"

Captain Dove frowned as if in deep thought, and Slyne looked very crossly at him.

"About three quarters of an hour," the old man answered, and, glancing at Slyne, chuckled hoarsely. "She\'s only been Lady Josceline for so long."

Mr. Jobling nodded understanding and the creases on his fleshy forehead disappeared again.

"And before that—?" he suggested, politely patient.

"Before that she was—what she still is so far\'s I\'m concerned—Saleh Harez, my adopted daughter."

"Sallie—Harris!" Mr. Jobling ejaculated. "Dear me! Did you say Sallie—er—Harris?"

"I said Saleh Harez," affirmed Captain Dove, and filled the glass at his elbow again. "But all that concerns you, so far\'s I can see, is that I\'ve known her ever since she was knee-high to me. I\'ve been a father to her all those years, and she\'s my adopted daughter. So now, you can take it from me, Mr. Jobling, that I\'m the joker, and both bowers too, in this merry little game."

"Which makes it all the more unfortunate for you that you haven\'t a single penny to stake on your hand," Slyne put in, while the lawyer looked somewhat blankly from one to the other of them. "So—don\'t waste any more time bluffing, but tell Jobling how you found Sal—Lady Josceline."

Captain Dove darted a very evil look at his friendly adviser. "And what if I refuse?" he asked.

Slyne almost smiled. "Why cut off your own nose to spite your face?" he returned. "You won\'t refuse, because it would cost you a hundred thousand dollars to do so."

Captain Dove stroked his chin contemplatively, and his face slowly cleared.

"A hundred and fifty thousand, you mean," he said in a most malevolent tone.<............