As to Dunwody himself, ruthless and arrogant as was his nature, he bore no trace of imperiousness now.  The silent lips and high color of the face before him he did not interpret to mean terror, but contempt.  In the fortunes of chance he had won her.  In the game of war she was his prisoner.  Yet no ancient warrior of old, rude, armored, beweaponed, unrelenting, ever stood more abashed before some high-headed woman captive.  He had won—­what?  Nothing, as he knew very well, beyond the opportunity to fight further for her, and under a far harder handicap, a handicap which he had foolishly imposed on himself.  This woman, seen face to face, yes, she was beautiful, desirable, covetable.  But she was not the sort of woman he had supposed her.  It was Carlisle, after all, who had won in the game!

For two moments he debated many things in his mind.  Did not women of old sometimes relent?  He asked himself over and over again the same questions, pleaded to himself the same arguments.  After all, he reasoned, this was only a woman.  Eventually she must yield to one sort of treatment or the other.  He had not reflected that, though the ages in some ways have stood still, in others they have gone forward.  In bodily presence woman has not much changed, this age with that.  The canons of art remain the same, the ideals of art are the same.  These and those lines, gracious, compelling,—­this and that color, enchanting, alluring, so much white flesh, thus much crown of tresses—­they have for ages served to rob men of reason.  They have not changed.  What this man could not realize was that there may be changes not of color and of curve.

Not so long as all this they gazed at each other, measured, took ground, gaging each the adversary opposite.

“Do not go!” he almost commanded.  She was half way to the door.

“Why not, sir?” She wheeled on him fiercely.

“Because,—­at least, you would not be so cruel—­”

“I thank you, but I am leaving the boat at the first opportunity.  It is impossible for us to continue an acquaintance formed thus irregularly.”

“On the contrary, my dear!” The ring in his voice terrified her, but his terms angered her yet more.

“I do not in the least understand you, sir!  I am accustomed to do quite as I like.  And you may address me as the Countess St. Auban.”

“Why should we talk of this?” he retorted.  “Why talk to me of countesses?  To me you are something better as you stand,—­the most beautiful girl, the most splendid human being, I ever saw in all my life.  If you are doing quite as you like, why should you ask me to come to your aid?  And why will you not now accept my aid when it is offered?  The relations under which you have been traveling with this other gentleman were not quite clear to me, but such as they were—­”

“Do you lack courage, sir, to say that he has quit-claimed me to you?  Am I still a prisoner?  Are you to be my new jailer?  By what right, then?”