o himself,
softly smiling. And then to Absalom: "Send Louis to me."

Louis, once his own body-servant, came promptly, in his white
jacket.

"This gentleman," said Grandemont, "will dine with me. Furnish him
with bath and clothes. In twenty minutes have him ready and dinner
served."

Louis approached the disreputable guest with the suavity due to a
visitor to Charleroi, and spirited him away to inner regions.

Promptly, in twenty minutes, Absalom announced dinner, and, a moment
later, the guest was ushered into the dining hall where Grandemont
waited, standing, at the head of the table. The attentions of Louis
had transformed the stranger into something resembling the polite
animal. Clean linen and an old evening suit that had been sent down
from town to clothe a waiter had worked a miracle with his exterior.
Brush and comb had partially subdued the wild disorder of his hair.
Now he might have passed for no more extravagant a thing than one of
those _poseurs_ in art and music who affect such oddity of guise.
The man's countenance and demeanour, as he approached the table,
exhibited nothing of the awkwardness or confusion to be expected
from his Arabian Nights change. He allowed Absalom to seat him at
Grandemont's right hand with the manner of one thus accustomed to
be waited upon.

"It grieves me," said Grandemont, "to be obliged to exchange names
with a guest. My own name is Charles."

"In the mountains," said the wayfarer, "they call me Gringo. Along
the roads they call me Jack."

"I prefer the latter," said Grandemont. "A glass of wine with you,
Mr. Jack."

Course after course was served by the supernumerous waiters.
Grandemont, inspired by the results of Andre's exquisite skill in
cookery and his own in the selection of wines became the model host,
talkative, witty, and genial. The guest was fitful in conversation.
His mind seemed to be sustaining a succession of waves of dementia
followed by intervals of comparative lucidity. There was the glassy
brightness of recent fever in his eyes. A long course of it must
have been the cause of his emaciation and weakness, his distracted
mind, and the dull pallor that showed even through the tan of wind
and sun.

"Charles," he said to Grandemont--for thus he seemed to interpret
his name--"you never saw the mountains dance, did you?"

"No, Mr. Jack," answered Grandemont, gravely, "the spectacle has
been denied me. But, I assure you, I can understand it must be a