have enjoyed my evening but for an inquisitive anxiety to get in touch
with the unsuspecting pair. Meanwhile the lilt of a waltz had mingled
with the click of billiard balls and the talking and laughing which make
a summer's night vocal in that outpost of pleasure on the silent
heights; and some of our party had gone off to dance. In the end I
followed them, sticks and all; but there was no Bob Evers among the
dancers, nor in the billiard-room, nor anywhere else indoors.

Then, last of all, I looked where Quinby had advised me to look, and
there sure enough, on the almost deserted terrace, were the couple whom
I had come several hundred miles to put asunder. Hitherto I had only
realised the distasteful character of my task; now at a glance I had my
first inkling of its difficulty; and there ended the premature
satisfaction with which I had learnt that there was "something in" the
rumour which had reached Catherine's ears.

There was no moon, but the mountain stars were the brightest I have ever
seen in Europe. The mountains themselves stood back, as it were,
darkling and unobtrusive; all that was left of the Matterhorn was a
towering gap in the stars; and in the faint cold light stood my
friends, somewhat close together, and I thought I saw the red tips of
two cigarettes. There was at least no mistaking the long loose limbs in
the light overcoat. And because a woman always looks relatively taller
than a man, this woman looked nearly as tall as this lad.

"Bob Evers? You may not remember me, but my name's Clephane--Duncan, you
know!"

I felt the veriest scoundrel, and yet the words came out as smoothly as
I have written them, as if to show me that I had been a potential
scoundrel all my life.

"Duncan Clephane? Why, of course I remember you. I should think I did! I
say, though, you must have had a shocking time!"

Bob's voice was quite quiet for all his astonishment, his manner a
miracle, though it was too dark to read the face; and his right hand
held tenderly to mine, as his eyes fell upon my sticks, while his left
poised a steady cigarette. And now I saw that there was only one red tip
after all.

"I read your name in the visitors' book," said I, feeling too big a
brute to acknowledge the boy's solicitude for me. "I--I felt certain it
must be you."

"How splendid!" cried the great fellow in his easy, soft, unconscious
voice, "By the way, may I introduce you to Mrs. Lascelles? Captain
Clephane's one of our ve