ying--" he began, and then stopped, as if searching in his own
mind for the clew to what had passed a moment earlier.

"You were thanking Captain Fyffe and Mr. Brunow."

"Gentlemen," said the count, with a complete momentary repossession of
himself, "I know not how to thank you. You have seen enough already to
know that the life I have led this many year's has left its mark upon
me. I fail in words--sometimes, to tell you the whole truth, I fail in
feelings. There are moments when I have not even the heart to be glad
that I am free again. But you will understand, and you will forgive
because you understand. If words of gratitude do not come easily to my
tongue, it is not because you have not deserved them."

"The man who really deserves the thanks of all of us," I answered, "is
Corporal Hinge. Without him we should have been nonplussed; with
him everything fell out in the simplest way. We have encountered no
difficulty, and run no dangers."

"But," said Brunow, in his lightest and airiest fashion, as if he
disclaimed credit in the very act of claiming it, "I need hardly tell
Miss Rossano that in fulfilling the commission we accepted at her hands
we should have been delighted to encounter either. As it was we had the
most extraordinary good-fortune in the world. The whole thing has been a
chapter of happy accidents."

"It pleases you to say so," said the count; "but my daughter and I enjoy
no less the privilege of gratitude."

The position was embarrassing; for the more I thought about it the more
I saw how little we had done, and how plain and simple a piece of duty
it had been to do that little.

"Your father is tired, Miss Rossano," I said, taking the shortest way
out of the difficulty. "You and he, besides, will have a thousand
things to say to each other with which nobody else will have a right to
interfere." I rose and held out my hand, and she came from behind her
father's chair to meet me with an exquisite frankness.

"You shall have my thanks, Captain Fyffe," she said, "all my life long,
whether you disclaim them or not. And you too, Mr. Brunow. I suppose we
all go to town together?"

The count had risen from his seat while she spoke, and stood before us
with one hand stretched out to Brunow and the other to myself. "I am
poor in words," he said, with a shaking voice; "I am poor in everything.
But believe me, gentlemen, I thank you, and shall thank you always. For
whatever of life is left to me I am yo