“C. Q.”; or, In the Wireless House
Trevelyan’s radiant color fled. Something had gone wrong—the news had leaked out! Could Micky have tricked her? Could he have endeavored to save her feelings by promising not to do something which he had already done? For an instant she was disinclined to accept such a possibility, then, as it seemed clear to her that there was no other way for the facts to have become known, she decided that Micky had simply taken her in with his childlike, guileless face and made a fool of her. And there leaped into her breast a fierce hatred of him—a hatred as full-blooded and intense as her passion for him had been before—less because of what he had done than because she, whose business in life was deceiving, had been deceived.
“A criminal?” she repeated innocently. “How interesting!”
“Yes,—is n’t it! Of course he may not be on my ship. But they traced him to the Continent. Perhaps he came aboard at ‘Gib.’” The Captain’s face betrayed ill-suppressed excitement.
“What has the poor man done?” asked Lily, putting her finger between the pages152
