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T four o'clock on Friday, after a perfect dream of a cruise, the Gray Gull drew into her dock, but Fay Judson looked in vain for her husband. For certain reasons she was painfully anxious to greet him—vague, undefinable reasons; emotions, perhaps, they were instead—but they made her doubly desirous to be folded to her husband's breast and made sure that she was entirely his.

But no husband was in sight. Instead—Blakeley, standing embarrassed and uncertain in the back of the crowd. He made his way to her as soon as the gangplank was down.

"Mr. Judson hopes you have had a pleasant cruise and regrets that a business trip has called him away."

"Out of town? What time will he get into the city this afternoon? Surely he could not have forgotten the Newcomb dinner."

"Not before tomorrow," admitted Blakeley, serious as the man was always serious.

Tomorrow? Fay could have cried with vexation; then something womanly, something more wifely than a sense of slight, got hold of her.