vitably have felt had he been taken and, shot.

Meanwhile, however, the lack of news from him, in another sense, would
have to be explained to Una sooner or later for a fitful correspondence
was maintained between brother and sister--and O'Moy dreaded the moment
when this explanation must be made. Lacking invention, he applied to
Tremayne for assistance, and Tremayne glumly supplied him with the
necessary lie that should meet Lady O'Moy's inquiries when they came.

In the end, however, he was spared the necessity of falsehood. For the
truth itself reached Lady O'Moy in an unexpected manner. It came about a
month after that day when O'Moy had first received news of the escapade
at Tavora. It was a resplendent morning of early June, and the adjutant
was detained a few moments from breakfast by the arrival of a mail-bag
from headquarters, now established at Vizeu. Leaving Captain Tremayne to
deal with it, Sir Terence went down to breakfast, bearing with him only
a few letters of a personal character which had reached him from friends
on the frontier.

The architecture of the house at Monsanto was of a semiclaustral
character; three sides of it enclosed a sheltered luxuriant garden,
whilst on the fourth side a connecting corridor, completing the
quadrangle, spanned bridgewise the spacious archway through which
admittance was gained directly from the parklands that sloped gently
to Alcantara. This archway, closed at night by enormous wooden doors,
opened wide during the day upon a grassy terrace bounded by a baluster
of white marble that gleamed now in the brilliant sunshine. It was
O'Moy's practice to breakfast out-of-doors in that genial climate, and
during April, before the sun had reached its present intensity, the
table had been spread out there upon the terrace. Now, however, it was
wiser, even in the early morning, to seek the shade, and breakfast was
served within the quadrangle, under a trellis of vine supported in the
Portuguese manner by rough-hewn granite columns. It was a delicious
spot, cool and fragrant, secluded without being enclosed, since through
the broad archway it commanded a view of the Tagus and the hills of
Alemtejo.

Here O'Moy found himself impatiently awaited that morning by his wife
and her cousin, Sylvia Armytage, more recently arrived from England.

"You are very late," Lady O'Moy greeted him petulantly. Since she spent
her life in keeping other people waiting, it naturally fretted her to