on the spot.

"It means," I said, "that there are too many people in this room. We
confuse her, and frighten her. Take her into her bedroom, Herr Grosse;
and only let the rest of us in, when you think right--one at a time."

Our excellent surgeon instantly seized on my idea, and made it his own.

"You are a phenix among womens," he said, paternally patting me on the
shoulder. "Which is most perfectest, your advice or your Mayonnaise, I am
at a loss to know." He turned to Lucilla, and raised her gently from her
chair. "Come into your own rooms with me, my poor little Feench. I shall
see if I dare take off your bandages to-day."

Lucilla clasped her hands entreatingly.

"You promised!" she said. "Oh, Herr Grosse, you promised to let me use my
eyes to-day!"

"Answer me this!" retorted the German. "Did I know, when I promised, that
I should find you all shaky-pale, as white as my shirts when he comes
back from the wash?"

"I am quite myself again," she pleaded faintly. "I am quite fit to have
the bandage taken off."

"What! you know better than I do? Which of us is surgeon-optic--you or
me? No more of this. Come under my arms! Come into the odder rooms!"

He put her arm in his, and walked with her to the door. There, her
variable humour suddenly changed. She rallied on the instant. Her face
flushed; her courage came back. To my horror, she snatched her arm away
from the surgeon, and refused to leave the room.

"No!" she said. "I am quite composed again; I claim your promise. Examine
me here. I must and will have my first look at Oscar in this room."

(I was afraid--literally afraid--to turn my eyes Oscar's way. I glanced
at Nugent instead. There was a devilish smile on his face that it nearly
drove me mad to see.)

"You must and weel?" repeated Grosse. "Now, mind!" He took out his watch.
"I give you one little minutes, to think in. If you don't come with me in
that time, you shall find it is I who must and weel. Now!"

"Why do you object to go into your room?" I asked.

"Because I want everybody to see me," she answered. "How many of you are
there here?"

"There are five of us. Mr. and Mrs. Finch; Mr. Nugent Dubourg; Oscar, and
myself."

"I wish there were five hundred of you, instead of five?" she burst out.

"Why?"

"Because you would see me pick out Oscar from all the rest, the instant
the bandage was off my eyes!"

Still holding to her own fatal conviction that the image in her mind of
Oscar was