It was Tony Standish who found himself practically ignored by Myra after dinner that evening, and almost for the first time he began to feel jealous, really jealous, of Don Carlos de Ruiz. Myra danced three times with the Spaniard, and “sat out” two more with him in the conservatory, flagrantly flirting with him, exercising all her powers of attraction and fascination, continually tempting Don Carlos to break his promise.

His dark eyes told her that she had fired his heart and set his pulses throbbing with desire, but no word of love crossed his lips. When they were dancing together, however, more than once he crushed her close to his breast, but Myra did not rebuke him, and several times she squeezed his hand and deliberately brushed his cheek with her hair during a Tango.

“I rather fancy I am going to justify my boast and take my revenge, and Don Carlos de Ruiz will learn to his cost that it isn’t safe to trifle with Myra Rostrevor,” she reflected. “I suppose I am taking an unfair advantage, but it serves Don Carlos right.”

She was careful to lock and bolt her bedroom door that night before retiring, and she left a light burning and sat up in bed waiting and watching expectantly. Two o’clock chimed, and Myra was beginning to nod drowsily, when a faint sound brought her to sudden wakefulness and alertness. Someone was trying the door of her bedroom! She saw the door-handle turn, and she held her breath and listened intently... The handle turned again ... turned back to its original position.... And that was all.

Listening with thudding heart, Myra could hear no sound from the other side of her locked and bolted door, and the handle did not move again. Slipping out of bed after a few minutes, she stole noiselessly across the room and, dropping on one knee, put her ear to the keyhole and listened, but heard no sound save the throbbing of her own heart.

She could not have explained what she expected, hoped, or dreaded to hear as she crouched there, straining her ears, but it was characteristic of her that suddenly she laughed aloud.

“So he was conceited enough to think that I would leave my bedroom door unlocked!” she whispered, as she went back to bed and switched off the light. “What sort of girl does he take me for? I don’t know whether to feel insulted or amused... But I’m glad I didn’t forget to lock and bolt the door. I wonder...”

Myra snuggled her head down in her pillow, but scarcely had she closed her eyes when there was a crash against her bedroom door, a shout, and then a shot, and the sound of more shouting. She sprang up convulsively, her hands pressed to her breast, screamed involuntarily, then, recovering herself, switched on the lights, sprung out of bed, unbolted and unlocked the door, and flung it open to find Don Carlos de Ruiz, clad in pyjamas and dressing gown, engaged in a desperate struggle with a burly, fully-dressed stranger on the floor of the corridor outside her room.

In one swift glance Myra saw that the stranger had a pistol clutched in his right hand, but that Don Carlos had a grip on the man’s right wrist and was desperately struggling to prevent his antagonist from using the weapon against him. She screamed again, and even as she did so Don Carlos, by some dexterous twist, got the armed man’s elbow across his knee, there was a howl of pain, and the pistol dropped from the fellow’s hand.

Quick as lightning Don Carlos released his grip, made a dive for the pistol and got it, then leapt to his feet.

“Now lie where you are, you swine, or I’ll kill you,” he snarled breathlessly.

“Blast you! You’ve broken my arm,” the man on the floor snarled back at him, writhing in agony. “Blast you! Don’t shoot. I surrender... Oh, Gawd! my arm! I wish I’d killed you, damn you!”

While this was happening, doors had been flung open, lights had been switched on, and scared women and startled men had appeared in the corridors from their bedrooms, excitedly demanding to know the cause of the uproar. Tony, in a suit of purple pyjamas, and with his sandy hair on end, was almost the first on the scene.

“What’s up? What’s happened? Who’s this fellow?” he asked breathlessly. “A burglar? Have you shot him, Carlos?”

“No, I think I have merely dislocated his elbow,” Don Carlos answered, without taking his eye off the brawny burglar, who was now sitting up nursing his damaged elbow and muttering curses through his clenched teeth. “He tried to shoot me when I surprised him as he was trying to force the door of Miss Rostrevor’s room. You’d better ’phone for the police and have the house searched in case he has accomplices.”

“You can save yourself the trouble,” growled the burglar. “I’m on my own. When you ’phone for the police, ask ’em to fetch a doctor with ’em. You’ve broken my ruddy arm, damn you!”

“Considering that you did your best to murder me, you dog, you can think yourself lucky that I did not kill you as soon as I got possession of your pistol,” retorted Don Carlos, who had recovered his breath.

There was little sleep for anyone at Auchinleven that night. The local Police Inspector and a Constable arrived after a long interval and took the burglar away, after making a search of the house, assisted by the servants, without finding any accomplices of the man in custody.

Next morning, of course, Don Carlos was the hero of the hour, and everyone was lavishing compliments and congratulations on him for having tackled an armed burglar single-handed and getting the better of the desperado.

“I thought I heard someone prowling about in the corridor and got up to investigate,” Don Carlos explained. “The fellow seemed to be trying to force the door of Miss Rostrevor’s room, and when I challenged him he whipped out a pistol and fired at me. Fortunately for me, he missed, and before he could fire again I grappled with him, managed to get a grip on his arm, and dislocated his elbow by a trick taught me years ago by an old wrestler.”

“I wonder why he was trying to force my door, which was locked and bolted, instead of discovering if some of the other doors had been left unlocked,” said Myra. “Oddly enough, I fancied I heard someone trying my door some time before I heard the shot. And I still think there was more than one burglar concerned,” she added, with a direct and challenging glance at Don Carlos.

“The Police Inspector tells me the man asserts he had no accomplices or confederates,” said Don Carlos, his face expressionless. “It is strange, nevertheless, that he should have attempted to force his way into your room in preference to any other.”

“Very strange!” agreed Myra. “And how fortunate for me that I should have happened to take the precaution of locking and bolting my door. Oddly enough, I had a sort of presentiment that if I did not bolt my door something dreadfully unpleasant might happen. Normally, you see, I don’t bolt the door or lock it. It I do, it means that I have to get up when my maid brings my morning tea. But the night before last I seemed to have a warning, so last night I took precautions against any unwanted visitor. I shall always lock and bolt my door in future.”

“Isn’t there an old saying that love laughs at locksmiths?” inquired Don Carlos, his expression still sphinx-like, but his eyes twinkling. “You looked delicious in your nightie and boudoir cap, Myra.”

“I shall remember to put on my dressing gown next time I am expecting burglars,” responded Myra, flushing slightly. “Thank you for saving me, gallant sir.”

She was wondering whether it was Don Carlos or the burglar who had tried her door, and she could hazard a guess as to why Carlos had happened to be in the corridor at two o’clock in the morning.

“I am thinking of becoming a burglar myself, dear lady, but please do not wear your dressing gown on that account,” laughed Don Carlos.

“I am wondering what might have happened if I had left my door unlocked,” said Myra, assuming a thoughtful expression, but avoiding Don Carlos’s eyes. “I feel half-inclined to leave it unlocked and unbolted to-night and risk the consequences.”

Again, however, she was careful to bolt and lock her bedroom door when she retired that night, but again she sat up in bed, as on the previous night, waiting and watching. And again, in the early hours of the morning, she saw the door handle turn, and she trilled out a laugh, hoping that the would-be “burglar” would hear it.

She continued to exercise her impish arts of tantalisation and her wiles of fascination on Don Carlos during the remainder of her stay at Auchinleven. Sometimes she would seem, metaphorically, to throw herself at his head and appear to be eager to surrender herself, at other times she would completely ignore him, and make open love to Tony in his presence. As time went on she realised that she was driving the Don almost to distraction, and she gloried in her powers.

“I feel certain that I have made him fall in love with me in earnest,” Myra reflected triumphantly. “He boasted that no woman could resist him. Women have been his playthings, and he must have fooled many. Now he is being fooled himself. I think he is desperately in love with me now.”

She was right in her surmise. Don Carlos’s love for her had become a burning, consuming passion. It needed the exercise of all his will power to keep it under control, and continually he had to curb his ardent passion and remind himself of his promise not to make love. But he was biding his time and had made a vow that he would make Myra pay in full for her coquetry.

The house party broke up at length and the guests dispersed, Myra and her aunt returning to London for the “Little Season” and to equip themselves for the winter cruise in Tony’s yacht, which was being refitted at Southampton.

Don Carlos had begged to be allowed to call, and both Lady Fermanagh and Myra had said graciously that they would be delighted to see him at any time.

“My thanks to you for having succeeded in keeping your promise,” said Myra, as they parted. “Accept my congratulations.”

“One reaches Heaven by way of Purgatory,” responded Don Carlos cryptically. “I am looking forward eagerly to our next meeting, when I shall be free to express myself.”

Expectant, and a trifle apprehensive, Myra awaited events. Nothing happened. A week elapsed without her seeing, or hearing from, Don Carlos, and when she made inquiries about him she learned from Tony that he had returned to Spain.

“Said he had some business matters to attend to, and wanted to arrange for our entertainment at his place out there,” explained Tony. “He promised to be back in time to join the yacht at Southampton.”

Myra was piqued. It hurt her pride to think she had not made a conquest after all, and had merely been flattering herself in imagining she had made Don Carlos fall in love with her.

“What a fool I feel!” soliloquised Myra. “I was confident he was in desperate earnest and was crazy about me, and I have been wondering how to resist and repel him. He shows how little he cares by going off to Spain without even calling to say good-bye, and with never a farewell note. Oh, what an exasperating creature!”

Another ten days passed uneventfully, and Myra found herself oddly discontented with life and things in general. It was a dismal November afternoon, she had no engagements, and was feeling utterly bored as she took tea alone in the drawing room of her aunt’s house in Mayfair, when, to her astonishment, Don Carlos de Ruiz was announced. Her heart gave a convulsive leap at the mere mention of his name, and it was throbbing faster than its wont as she rose to greet him, although she assumed an attitude of cool indifference.

“Sure, and it’s seriously annoyed with you, I am, Don Carlos, and you needn’t expect me to say I’m glad to see you,” she said in her musical Irish voice as she gave him her hand. “How very rude of you to disappear without even a word of farewell. Rude, did I say? Perhaps crude would be a better word. How rude and crude to dash back to Spain to attend to some matter of business when you had been trying to pretend to be hopelessly in love.”

“Not ‘hopelessly,’ Myra,” Don Carlos responded quietly, raising her fingers to his lips. “Never have I been ‘hopelessly’ in love, for always I have been sure at heart that I should win.... So you have missed me, darling, and now your heart is throbbing because I have come back to you? I am glad. I went away without a word in the hope that by so doing I should punish you for your cruelty in tempting and tantalising me as you did at Auchinleven.”

“Tempting and tantalising you!” exclaimed Myra, and trilled out a laugh. “And you think, you conceited man, that you were punishing me by going to Spain for a fortnight or so without even having the politeness to say au revoir! How very amusing! And how very crude and rude! Didn’t you understand I was paying you back in your own coin at Auchinleven by pretending to be in love? So you went away with the idea of punishing me!”

“I found it necessary to return to my home in order to take precautionary measures against the bandit, El Diablo Cojuelo, who is evidently planning fresh mischief,” Don Carlos explained. “Now I have come back to you to redeem my promise.”

“Your promise?” queried Myra, forcing herself to meet his ardent glance. “I don’t understand. What promise?”

“My promise to kiss you in the way you wanted to be kissed by the man who loves you,” said Don Carlos quickly; and before Myra realised what was happening she was crushed close to his breast and he was kissing her as she had never been kissed before, hungrily, fiercely, passionately, ardently.

For a few minutes she found herself, in some mysterious way, robbed of all powers of resistance. Don Carlos’s lips were crushed on her own, and his burning kisses seemed to be drugging her brain and drawing the very heart out of her. Then suddenly she struggled and broke from him, her lovely face aflame, her bosom heaving tempestuously, her breath coming and going in sobbing gasps.

“How dare you! Oh, how dare you!” she panted. “You brute! You brute! I could kill you!”

She dropped limply into a chair and covered her burning face with her hands. She was trembling, her heart was throbbing as if it would burst, and her brain was in a turmoil. Don Carlos stood silent for a few moments, his dark eyes still aflame with ardour as he looked down at Myra. He, too, was trembling slightly, and a spot of hectic colour glowed on each cheek-bone.

“Why blame or reproach me, Myra darling?” he said at last, his deep voice vibrant. “Remember that you tempted me, challenged me. It was to me that you spoke, and not to Standish, when you said you wanted to be kissed by the man who loved you, and not by a cold-blooded Englishman. I promised you that night I would kiss you in the way you longed to be kissed, in the way I longed to kiss you, and I have fulfilled my promise in part. Myra, belovedest, the nectar of your lips has increased my longing a thousandfold. Tell me, darling, that my kisses have fired your heart with the love for which I crave, and ”

“I hate you, hate you, and I shall never forgive you for this!” burst out Myra passionately, starting to her feet. “Go away at once, and don’t dare to come near me again. How dare you, how dare you kiss me like that! If I were to tell Tony ”

She broke off with a sharp intake of breath, for at that moment the butler tapped at the drawing room door and opened it.

“Mr. Standish,” he announced; and Tony walked in, as if he were an actor taking his “cue.”

Antony Standish could (but didn’t) boast of a ’Varsity education, and he prided himself on his smartness, but he was far from being “gleg at the uptak’,” as the Scots say, and his powers of observation and deduction assuredly would not have qualified him for a position as a Scotland Yard “sleuth.” Seemingly he was quite unconscious of the electrical atmosphere as he entered, and quite failed to notice Myra’s agitation.

“Hullo, Don Carlos! What a surprise!” he cried breezily. “How are you, old fellow? ... Hello, Myra, my dear. Thought I’d blow in on the chance of finding you at home this beastly afternoon and cadge a cup of tea.... Where did you spring from, Don Carlos? Thought you were still in Spain. Tremendously glad to see you again, old man. When did you get back? You’re looking tremendously fit.”

“Thank you,” said Don Carlos, forcing a smile as he shook hands. “I got back to London less than an hour ago, and hastened to call on Miss Rostrevor to assure her of my undying regard and to redeem a promise.”

He darted a side glance at Myra, who was nervously biting her lips and trying to compose herself.

“Awfully nice of you, old chap. Glad you’re back,” drawled the unobservant Tony. “I say, Myra, dear, aren’t you going to offer me a cup of tea? I suppose I may smoke as Lady Fermanagh isn’t here?”

Myra found herself at a loss to know how to deal with the situation. To tell Tony what had happened would inevitably lead to a painful scene, perhaps even to violence; to refrain from telling him would seem like condoning Don Carlos’s conduct. She was torn by conflicting emotions and could not make up her mind how to act. Act, however, she did, in a literal sense, for although her heart was still throbbing wildly and her mind was in a whirl, she managed somehow to assume an almost casual air.

“Why, of course you may smoke, Tony,” she said, after ringing the bell and ordering more tea. “I’ll have a cigarette myself to soothe my nerves.”

“Never noticed any signs of nerves about you, old thing,” laughed Tony, as he proffered his case and struck a match to light the cigarette Myra accepted. “Nerves! The risks you have been taking of late in the hunting field have made my blood run cold. The way you took that hedge last week during the run with the Quorn made my heart stand still. Honestly, Myra, I shall be glad when I have you safely aboard the Killarney, and we are on our way to Spain.”

“I am not going to Spain,” said Myra, very abruptly.

“Not going to Spain?” repeated Tony, in surprise.

“No, Tony, I am not going to Spain. Don Carlos has offended me beyond pardon.”

“I say, Myra, you’re ragging, aren’t you?” asked Tony. “I thought you had made it up with Don Carlos. Don’t tell me the villain has been making love to you again!”

“Why, of course I have,” exclaimed Don Carlos. “I am madly in love with Myra, and it is because she is afraid of falling as desperately in love with me as I am with her, and being forced, in consequence, to jilt you, that she has again decided not to go to Spain. She is afraid of me and of love.”

“What a pair of leg-pullers you are!” chuckled Tony, assuming the whole thing was a jest. “Half the men one meets are in love with Myra, but I refuse to believe she is afraid of any of them.”

“Ah, but she is afraid of me, my dear Standish, and you should realise I am your most dangerous rival,” Don Carlos said gravely, and again Tony chuckled amusedly. “Perhaps it is not only of me but of herself, and for herself, that Myra is afraid,” Carlos continued, with a challenging glance at Myra, who felt she would like to box his ears and also to shake Tony for being so dense. “The lovely senorita is also afraid of being captured by El Diablo Cojuelo, who would make her an ideal husband.”

“I say, that’s hardly complimentary, old fellow!” Tony commented. “Sort of faux pas, isn’t it, to suggest that a brigand would be a better husband for Myra than yours truly, and that Myra is a suitable wife for a brigand?”

“That, of course, depends on the brigand,” answered Don Carlos, with a smile. “Of course, if Myra is really scared, and is genuinely afraid to come to Spain lest she should lose her heart ”

“I am afraid of nothing!” interrupted Myra, exasperated beyond measure; and immediately she regretted the impulsive words.

“So you will prove the fact by keeping your promise to come to Spain as my guest?” queried Don Carlos quickly.

“That will depend on whether you know your duty to a guest and your obligations as a host,” retorted Myra curtly, and Tony raised his eyebrows, surprised by her unusual rudeness.

“I flatter myself, dear lady, that I have a reputation as a host whose hospitality is boundless,” said Don Carlos gravely.

A footman entering with the tea-tray relieved the tension, and Tony began to question Don Carlos about his trip, and to tell him what sport he had been enjoying.