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Laurence stared "Are you already married?" he said, doubtfully

"Oh! Lord, if only I were," Granby said "My sister wanted to settle one of her friends upon e it! Not even Haamist, I suppose No, Laurence--I--I am an invert"

"What?" Laurence said, taken aback--the practice was scarcely unknown to hi from the Navy; he had known several fine officers addicted to the crinored; but he had always understood it to steress, which could not be said to be the case for an aviator

"Well, I don’t knohat the cause of it is, but it hasn’t anything to do with opportunity; for me, anyway," Granby said shortly, and they fell silent

Laurence did not knohat to say He had never suspected Granby of being even ordinarily unchaste; and belatedly realized that in itself was evidence "I am very sorry," he said, after athe expression inadequate to the confession

"Oh--" Granby shrugged, with one shoulder, "in the ordinary course of things, you know, it scarcely makes a difference I have never seen the use for an aviator of battening on soon, and leaving her to sit in an empty house eleven months in twelve for the rest of her life, while you live in a covert with your beast And for that matter, I had as soon have a little quiet discretion with another officer, as make my way in the ha’penny whorehouses outside the coverts like other fellows do" He jerked a hand, as if to fling away the notion "But now--this lunacy--"

"Ah," Laurence said, braced hiainst the indelicacy of the question; but after all, on the Navy side he knew of at least Captain Farraway: eleven children, one for every hoe, and his pattern-card wife unlikely to have strayed at all much less in so precise a fashion; so plainly it was not ie that if I must, I expect," Granby said "I would have to try and put h anyway But once or twice is not the sae She must resent it; the Inca, I mean, and why shan’t she say ‘off with his head’ if she don’t like it?"

"If she should not learn--?" Laurence offered "Not that I would counsel you to dishonesty," he added, "but if it is no barrier to your duty to her--"

"It won’t do," Granby said, bluntly "Not that I would make a cake of myself, any more than I ever have, but I don’t undertake to be a monk the rest of my days, either I would try and be discreet; but it is more than I expect that no-one should find out and blab to her: I shouldn’t be just some aviator, that no-one cares about, but the husband of their queen"

Laurence said slowly, "And yet--she cannot be looking for affection of the ordinary sort which one e For that h if not already that Napoleon has divorced another woman for her, one whom he married for passion; and she herself is a recentHer esture; I cannot think she would take it as an injury in the sae contract under the more ordinary circumstances"

"Laurence," Granby cried, with a look of reproach, "I should not have said a word to you of any of this, if I had been set on fire and dragged by wild horses, except that I hadn’t the least notion how to get out of the thing without help; and now you are as h with it"

Laurence, sorry, said, "I would say, rather, that I do not kno to advise you," but in truth, he could not claim Granby’s confession had successfully overcoes of the es of the alternative It only increased in greatLaurence able to feel in earnest that it was not Granby’s duty to allow the arrangeht be achieved "This alone does not seee than must be all the other obstacles: the difference in your station, and the uncertainty of the local politics; the ruin which it must make of your career--"

Here Laurence trailed off: for he himself had ruined his career, to carry out what he felt his duty; and Granby, who had looked away, knew it: Laurence’s own actions spoke too loudly of the choice he himself would make

"It is not, of course, your duty," Laurence said

"I beg you consider whether it is not your duty," Hammond said, when they had co in wait for them, or very nearly, at the door "Of course there is no question of i," he added, "none at all--"

If this were true on Hae assumption, it was certainly not true on Iskierka’s; she dismissed Granby’s protests one and all, even the last desperate attempt, when he corralled her in private, out of earshot of everyone else but Laurence "Of course I know that you are not fond of women, in that way," she said "I am not stupid; I know that you and Captain Little were--"

"Oh, for the Lord’s sake, will you not be quiet," Granby cried, scarlet, and looked sidelong at Laurence in misery

"Well, why did you speak of it, then?" Iskierka said reasonably "I did not raise the subject: Ih I don’t see why; it is not as though I would allow anyone to arrest you, no nify--Anahuarque does not want you to be in love with her, only to s, and be Emperor I will ask Maila if you like, to be sure there will be no difficulty about it, but there shan’t be"