“In a week—­he! he!—­only a week for preparation—­only seven days to leave all—­short notice!”

“More than sufficient,” replied Philip, rising up from the sofa.  “You may tell your captain that I shall not fail.  Come, Amine, we must lose no time.”

“No, indeed,” replied Amine, “and our first duty is hospitality:  Mynheer, may we offer you refreshment after your walk?”

“This day week,” said Schriften, addressing Philip, and without making a reply to Amine.  Philip nodded his head, the little man turned on his heel and left the room, and in a short time was out of sight.

Amine sank down on the sofa.  The breaking-up of her short hour of happiness had been too sudden, too abrupt, and too cruelly brought about for a fondly doting, although heroic, woman.  There was an evident malignity in the words and manner of the one-eyed messenger, an appearance as if he knew more than others, which awed and confused both Philip and herself.  Amine wept not, but she covered her face with her hands as Philip, with no steady pace, walked up and down the small room.  Again, with all the vividness of colouring, did the scenes half forgotten recur to his memory.  Again did he penetrate the fatal chamber—­again was it obscure.  The embroidery lay at his feet, and once more he started as when the letter appeared upon the floor.

They had both awakened from a dream of present bliss, and shuddered at the awful future which presented itself.  A few minutes were sufficient for Philip to resume his natural self-possession.  He sat down by the side of his Amine, and clasped her in his arms.  They remained silent.  They knew too well each other’s thoughts; and, excruciating as was the effort, they were both summoning up their courage to bear, and steeling their hearts against the conviction that, in this world, they must now expect to be for a time, perhaps for ever, separated.

Amine was the first to speak:  removing her arms, which had been wound round her husband, she first put his hand to her heart, as if to compress its painful throbbings, and then observed—­

“Surely that was no earthly messenger, Philip!  Did you not feel chilled to death when he sat by you?  I did, as he came in.”

Philip, who had the same thought as Amine, but did not wish to alarm her, answered confusedly—­

“Nay, Amine, you fancy—­that is, the suddenness of his appearance and his strange conduct have made you imagine this; but I saw in him but a man who, from his peculiar deformity, has become an envious outcast of society—­debarred from domestic happiness, from the smiles of the other sex; for what woman could smile upon such a creature?  His bile raised at so much beauty in the arms of another, he enjoyed a malignant pleasure in giving a message which he felt would break upon those pleasures from which he is cut off.  Be assured, my love, that it was nothing more.”