st be heir to a peerage, I felt convinced; nobody short of
that rank would consider himself entitled to stare with such frank
unconcern at an unknown lady.

Presently it further occurred to me that the satellite's back seemed
strangely familiar. 'I have seen that man somewhere, Elsie,' I
whispered, putting aside the wisps of hair that blew about my face.

'So have I, dear,' Elsie answered, with a slight shudder. And I was
instinctively aware that I too disliked him.

As Elsie spoke, the man turned, and strolled slowly past us, with that
ineffable insolence which is the other side of the flunkey's
insufferable self-abasement. He cast a glance at us as he went by, a
withering glance of brazen effrontery. We knew him now, of course: it
was that variable star, our old acquaintance, Mr. Higginson the courier.

He was here as himself this time; no longer the count or the mysterious
faith-healer. The diplomat hid his rays under the garb of the
man-servant.

'Depend upon it, Elsie,' I cried, clutching her arm with a vague sense
of fear, 'this man means mischief. There is danger ahead. When a
creature of Higginson's sort, who has risen to be a count and a
fashionable physician, descends again to be a courier, you may rest
assured it is because he has something to gain by it. He has some deep
scheme afloat. And _we_ are part of it.'

'His master looks weak enough and silly enough for anything,' Elsie
answered, eyeing the suspected lordling. 'I should think he is just the
sort of man such a wily rogue would naturally fasten upon.'

'When a wily rogue gets hold of a weak fool, who is also dishonest,' I
said, 'the two together may make a formidable combination. But never
mind. We're forewarned. I think I shall be even with him.'

That evening, at dinner in the saloon, the pea-green young man strolled
in with a jaunty air and took his seat next to us. The Red Sea, by the
way, was kinder than the Mediterranean: it allowed us to dine from the
very first evening. Cards had been laid on the plates to mark our
places. I glanced at my neighbour's. It bore the inscription, 'Viscount
Southminster.'

That was the name of Lord Kynaston's eldest son--Lady Georgina's nephew;
Harold Tillington's cousin! So _this_ was the man who might possibly
inherit Mr. Marmaduke Ashurst's money! I remembered now how often and
how fervently Lady Georgina had said, 'Kynaston's sons are all fools.'
If the rest came up to sample, I was inclined to agree