ed the Commandant.

k you might have told me," she

dear you

nk y

ey

ace. "It is many years since our first meeting, and unhappily we have the date of it fixed. Give me credit that I reminded you;

hat the lantern showed him, and-here was the strange part of the business-it had been growing younger since she stepped off the ship, and somehow it

as simplicity, and, after all, the Commanda

have spirited these females into my quarters, I c

ook he

ust deal with them, while you go off with

and-and I think-by the look of the

lantern, as it vanished in the fog. With a shake of the shoulders he pull

Gabr

Vigou

unless-" He paused and gazed around, as if to

just saying to Charlotte here, 'Think what a

"but the woman, a few hours before, had shown no mercy to me.") "Indeed, ma'am?" said

erience, sir-the most terrible fri

happened to

came about th

deserting me,"

ed to express perplexity; in truth it covered amusement and a

ice faltering a little, "You don't mean

to say that the gentlemen were escorting us home, but, mee

eck,

me you were down helping with the boats-you and her husband and Archelaus, though what help you three supposed yourselv

in distress-a large liner-had found herself among the Hell-deeps, of all abominably awkward places. But by the

"Oh, will someone kindly tell me whether I am standing on my head or my heels! A large liner?

andant, still gravely, "that you are not exa

ed for home and found we were half-way up Garrison Hill, and a

ead; and it must be conced

churchyard?" h

iel threw herself desperately on the offensive-"how

a woman, did you say?"

woman; a bed

t we saw her?-that it wasn't a-a sort of mistake? It certainly seemed

didn't we see her

I have seen such a number of thi

rs. Treacher?" suggested

bout in silks and furs and low bodices with a thous

the Commandant, turning, as the door open

h her. At any rate, she cordially hated Miss Gabriel, and she took,

know now?" she demanded,

a husky voice, while he pretended to trim t

d what's more, I don't go a-sheevoing it around Garrison Hill in the smal

opening and shutting her mouth like a fish. "The ladies have lost their way in the fog, and were, on the whole, extremely fortunate to re

good of you," stam

protested, with a

tterly angry, for the moment she was cowed, and sh

t now to make light of them. Accidents even more extraordinary had happened in fogs before now. He related how two companies of the Naval Brigade, under Sevastopol, had come within an ace of firing on each other

llusion to it. Their silence, for which at first he w

at he, too, had been ch

re within doors. Miss Gabriel admitted herself with a latch-key. Mrs. Pope's timid knock was answered by her astonished husband, who, having ju

withdrew. He had sighed, before now, as he had shut Mr. and Mrs. Pope's

e Vashti had dragged the sofa across the room and sat, with her fur cloak thrown back, toasting h

out sheets to air for me. Now fill your pipe,

d in the tobacco jar for a few dry crumbs, filled, and lit

owly, and blinking at the flash of jewels below he

out it," sh

ching her, while she laughed softly, leaning forw