"I do!"

"Listen!" he said again, and his voice was stern. "Sir Roland Brooke has
returned home. He knows that you have disobeyed him. He knows that you
are here with me. You will not dare to face him. You have gone too far
to return."

She gasped hysterically, and tottered for an instant, but recovered
herself.

"I will--I will go back!" she said.

"He will beat you like a labourer's wife," warned the jester. "He may do
worse."

She was swaying as she stood.

"He will do--as he sees fit," she said.

He stooped a little lower.

"I would make you happy, Lady Una," he whispered. "I would protect
you--shelter you--love you!"

She flung out her hands with a wild and desperate gesture. The
magnetism of his presence had become horrible to her.

"I am going to him--now," she said.

Behind him she saw, in the brightening moonlight, the opening which she