French
Captain Fioupi hanged himself from Mary Odling's bacon-rack, two years
ago the first of this very next month, I haven't been able to look at
a bit."

"Poor gentleman! Why did he do it?"

"The Lord knows, Miss. But they said it was home-sickness."

From the street came the voices of Captain Fioupi's compatriots, merry
at their work. Dorothea had scarcely begun breakfast before her
brothers entered, and she had to pour out tea for them. Narcissus took
his seat at once. Endymion stood stamping his feet and warming his
hands by the fire. He bent and with his finger flicked out a crust of
snow from between his breeches and the tops of his riding-boots. It
fell on the hearthstone and sputtered.

"The roads," he announced, are not very bad beyond the bridge. That is
the worst spot, and I have sent down a gang to clear it. Our guests
ought to be able to depart before noon, though I won't answer for the
road Yeovil Way. One carrier--Allworthy--has come through to the
bridge, but says he passed Solomon's van in a drift about four miles
back, this side of the Cheriton oak. He reports Bayfield Hill safe
enough; but that I discovered for myself."

"It seems quite a treat for them," Dorothea remarked.

His eyebrows went up.

"The guests, do you mean?"

He turned to the fire and picked up the tongs.

She laughed.

"No, I mean the prisoners; I was listening to their voices. Just now
they were throwing snowballs."

Endymion dropped the tongs with a clatter; picked them up, set them in
place, and faced the room again with a flush which might have come
from stooping over the fire.

"Come to breakfast, dear," said Dorothea, busy with the tea-urn. "I
have a small plan I want your permission for, and your help. It is
about the prisoners. General Rochambeau and M. Raoul--"

"Are doubtless prepared to teach me my business," snapped Endymion,
who seemed in bad humour this morning.

"No--but listen, dear! They praise you warmly. For whom but my brother
would these poor men have worked as they did upon the Orange Room--
and all to show their gratitude? But it appears the worst part of
captivity is its tedium and the way it depresses the mind; one sees
that it must be. They dread Sundays most of all. And I said I would
speak to you, and if any way could be found--"

"My dear Dorothea," Endymion slipped his hands beneath his coat-tails
and stood astraddle, "I have not often to request you, to mind your
own affairs; but r