“No, but he is an officer, and it is I that brought him here.”

“Very good, I will fight to the last drop of my blood; but I warn you your friend is a thief.  But go; I will await you.”

In the course of a quarter of an hour they all came out, but the Englishman and Pocchini followed me alone.  There were a good many people about, and I went before them till we reached Hyde Park.  Pocchini attempted to speak to me, but I replied, lifting my cane,—­

“Scoundrel, draw your sword, unless you want me to give you a thrashing!”

“I will never draw upon a defenceless man.”

I gave him a blow with my cane by way of answer, and the coward, instead of drawing his sword, began to cry out that I wished to draw him into a fight.  The Englishman burst out laughing and begged me to pardon his interference, and then, taking me by the arm, said,—­

“Come along, sir, I see you know the gentleman.”

The coward went off in another direction, grumbling as he went.

On the way I informed the officer of the very good reasons I had for treating Pocchini as a rogue, and he agreed that I had been perfectly right.  “Unfortunately,” he added, “I am in love with one of his daughters.”

When we were in the midst of St. James’s Park we saw them, and I could not help laughing when I noticed Goudar with one of them on each side.

“How did you come to know these ladies?” said I.

“Their father the captain,” he answered, “has sold me jewels; he introduced me to them.”

“Where did you leave our father?” asked one.

“In Hyde Park, after giving him a caning.”

“You served him quite right.”

The young Englishman was indignant to hear them approving my ill-treatment of their father, and shook my hand and went away, swearing to me that he would never be seen in their company again.

A whim of Goudar’s, to which I was weak enough to consent, made me dine with these miserable women in a tavern on the borders of London.  The rascally Goudar made them drunk, and in this state they told some terrible truths about their pretended father.  He did not live with them, but paid them nocturnal visits in which he robbed them of all the money they had earned.  He was their pander, and made them rob their visitors instructing them to pass it off as a joke if the theft was discovered.  They gave him the stolen articles, but he never said what he did with them.  I could not help laughing at this involuntary confession, remembering what Goudar had said about Pocchini selling him jewels.

After this wretched meal I went away leaving the duty of escorting them back to Goudar.  He came and saw me the next day, and informed me that the girls had been arrested and taken to prison just as they were entering their house.

“I have just been to Pocchini’s,” said he, “but the landlord tells me he has not been in since yesterday.”