he corner caught my eye. At home they used sometimes to call me, partly
in mockery, partly in earnest, "Bonny May." The sobriquet had hitherto
been a mere shadow, a meaningless thing, to me. I liked to hear it, but
had never paused to consider whether it were appropriate or not. In my
brief intercourse with my venerable suitor, Sir Peter, I had come a
little nearer to being actively aware that I was good-looking, only to
anathematize the fact. Now, catching sight of my reflection in the
mirror, I wondered eagerly whether I really were fair, and wished I had
some higher authority to think so than the casual jokes of my sisters.
It did not add to my presence of mind to find that my involuntary glance
to the mirror had been intercepted--perhaps even my motive guessed
at--he appeared to have a frightfully keen instinct.

"Have you seen the Dom?" was all he said; but it seemed somehow to give
a point to what had passed.

"The Dom--what is the Dom?"

"The _Koelner Dom_; the cathedral."

"Oh, no! Oh, should we have time to see it?" I exclaimed. "How I should
like it!"

"Certainly. It is close at hand. Suppose we go now."

Gladly I rose, as he did. One of my most ardent desires was about to be
fulfilled--not so properly and correctly as might have been desired,
but--yes, certainly more pleasantly than under the escort of Miss
Hallam, grumbling at every groschen she had to unearth in payment.

Before we could leave our seclusion there came up to us a young man who
had looked at us through the door and paused. I had seen him; had seen
how he said something to a companion, and how the companion shook his
head dissentingly. The first speaker came up to us, eyed me with a look
of curiosity, and turning to my protector with a benevolent smile, said:

"Eugen Courvoisier! _Also hatte ich doch Recht!_"

I caught the name. The rest was of course lost upon me. Eugen
Courvoisier? I liked it, as I liked him, and in my young enthusiasm
decided that it was a very good name. The new-comer, who seemed as if
much pleased with some discovery, and entertained at the same time,
addressed some questions to Courvoisier, who answered him tranquilly
but in a tone of voice which was very freezing; and then the other, with
a few words and an unbelieving kind of laugh, said something about a
_schoene Geschichte_, and, with another look at me, went out of the
coffee-room again.

We went out of the hotel, up the street to the cathedral. It was th