two of sheep.  I have named the talismans on which I habitually depend, but here was a conjuncture in which both were wholly useless.  The copestone of a wall arrayed with broken bottles is no favourable rostrum; and I might be as eloquent as Pitt, and as fascinating as Richelieu, and neither the gardener nor the shepherd lads would care a halfpenny.  In short, there was no escape possible from my absurd position:  there I must continue to sit until one or other of my neighbours should raise his eyes and give the signal for my capture.

The part of the wall on which (for my sins) I was posted could be scarce less than twelve feet high on the inside; the leaves of the beech which made a fashion of sheltering me were already partly fallen; and I was thus not only perilously exposed myself, but enabled to command some part of the garden walks and (under an evergreen arch) the front lawn and windows of the cottage.  For long nothing stirred except my friend with the spade; then I heard the opening of a sash; and presently after saw Miss Flora appear in a morning wrapper and come strolling hitherward between the borders, pausing and visiting her flowers—­herself as fair.  There was a friend; here, immediately beneath me, an unknown quantity—­ the gardener:  how to communicate with the one and not attract the notice of the other?  To make a noise was out of the question; I dared scarce to breathe.  I held myself ready to make a gesture as soon as she should look, and she looked in every possible direction but the one.  She was interested in the vilest tuft of chickweed, she gazed at the summit of the mountain, she came even immediately below me and conversed on the most fastidious topics with the gardener; but to the top of that wall she would not dedicate a glance!  At last she began to retrace her steps in the direction of the cottage; whereupon, becoming quite desperate, I broke off a piece of plaster, took a happy aim, and hit her with it in the nape of the neck.  She clapped her hand to the place, turned about, looked on all sides for an explanation, and spying me (as indeed I was parting the branches to make it the more easy), half uttered and half swallowed down again a cry of surprise.

The infernal gardener was erect upon the instant.  ’What’s your wull, miss?’ said he.

Her readiness amazed me.  She had already turned and was gazing in the opposite direction.  ‘There’s a child among the artichokes,’ she said.

‘The Plagues of Egyp’!  I’ll see to them!’ cried the gardener truculently, and with a hurried waddle disappeared among the evergreens.

That moment she turned, she came running towards me, her arms stretched out, her face incarnadined for the one moment with heavenly blushes, the next pale as death.  ’Monsieur de.  Saint-Yves!’ she said.

‘My dear young lady,’ I said, ’this is the damnedest liberty—­I know it!  But what else was I to do?’