CHAPTER THE FIFTH

Candlelight View of the Man

THERE had been barely light enough left for me to read by. Zillah lit the
candles and drew the curtains. The silence which betokens a profound
disappointment reigned in the room.

"Who can he be?" repeated Lucilla, for the hundredth time. "And why
should your looking at him have distressed him? Guess, Madame
Pratolungo!"

The last sentence in the gazetteer's description of Exeter hung a little
on my mind--in consequence of there being one word in it which I did not
quite understand--the word "Assizes." I have, I hope, shown that I
possess a competent knowledge of the English language, by this time. But
my experience fails a little on the side of phrases consecrated to the
use of the law. I inquired into the meaning of "Assizes," and was
informed that it signified movable Courts, for trying prisoners at given
times, in various parts of England. Hearing this, I had another of my
inspirations. I guessed immediately that the interesting stranger was a
criminal escaped from the Assizes.

Worthy old Zillah started to her feet, convinced that I had hit him off
(as the English saying is) to a T. "Mercy preserve us!" cried the nurse,
"I haven't bolted the garden door!"

She hurried out of the room to defend us from robbery and murder, before
it was too late. I looked at Lucilla. She was leaning back in her chair,
with a smile of quiet contempt on her pretty face. "Madame Pratolungo,"
she remarked, "that is the first foolish thing you have said, since you
have been here."

"Wait a little, my dear," I rejoined. "You have declared that nothing is
known of this man. Now you mean by that--nothing which satisfies _you._
He has not dropped down from Heaven, I suppose? The time when he came
here, must be known. Also, whether he came alone, or not. Also, how and
where he has found a lodging in the village. Before I admit that my guess
is completely wrong, I want to hear what general observation in Dimchurch
has discovered on the subject of this gentleman. How long has he been
here?"

Lucilla did not, at first, appear to be much interested in the purely
practical view of the question which I had just placed before her.

"He has been here a week," she answered carelessly.

"Did he come, as I came, over the hills?"

"Yes."

"With a guide, of course?"

Lucilla suddenly sat up in her chair.

"With his brother," she said. "His _twin_ brother, Madame Pratolungo."

_I_ s