letters were in the bag, all the way from England.  For a minute, there was a downright trial of muscle and will:  the porter appeared furiously excited, Skepsey had a look of cooled steel.  Then the Frenchman, requiring to shrug, gave way to the Englishman’s eccentric obstinacy, and signified that he was his guide.  Quite so, and Skepsey showed alacrity and confidence in following; he carried his bag.  But with the remembrance of the kindly serviceable man at Rouen, he sought to convey to the porter, that the terms of their association were cordial.  A waving of the right hand to the heavens ratified the treaty on the French side.  Nods and smiles and gesticulations, with across-Channel vocables, as it were Dover cliffs to Calais sands and back, pleasantly beguiled the way down to the Hotel du Paradis, under the Mausoleum heights, where Skepsey fumbled at his pocket for coin current; but the Frenchman, all shaken by a tornado of negation, clapped him on the shoulder, and sang him a quatrain.  Skepsey had in politeness to stand listening, and blinking, plunged in the contrition of ignorance, eclipsed.  He took it to signify something to the effect, that money should not pass between friends.  It was the amatory farewell address of Henri IV. to his Charmante Gabrielle; and with

                        ’Perce de mille lords,
                         L’honneur m’appelle
                         Au champ de Mars,’

the Frenchman, in a backing of measured steps, apologized for his enforced withdrawal from the stranger who had captured his heart.

Skepsey’s card was taken in the passage of the hotel.  A clean-capped maid, brave on the legs, like all he had seen of these people, preceded him at quick march to an upper chamber.  When he descended, bag in hand, she flung open the salon-door of a table d’hote, where a goodly number were dining and chattering; waiters drew him along to the section occupied by his master’s party.  A chair had been kept vacant for him; his master waved a hand, his dear ladies graciously smiled; he struck the bag in front of a guardian foot, growing happy.  He could fancy they had not seen the English newspapers.  And his next observation of the table showed him wrecked and lost:  Miss Nesta’s face was the oval of a woeful O at his wild behaviour in England during their absence.  She smiled.  Skepsey had nevertheless to consume his food—­excellent, very tasty soup-with the sour sauce of the thought that he must be tongue-tied in his defence for the time of the dinner.

‘No, dear Skips, please! you are to enjoy yourself,’ said Nesta.

He answered confusedly, trying to assure her that he was doing so, and he choked.