tlemen,"
he said, "help me!"

"Are you a German?" asked Boleskey.

"Yes," said the youth.

"Then you may rot!"

"Master, look here!" Tearing open his coat, the youth displayed his
skin, and a leather belt drawn tight round it. Again Swithin felt that
desire to take to his heels. He was filled with horrid forebodings--a
sense of perpending intimacy with things such as no gentleman had
dealings with.

The Hungarian crossed himself. "Brother," he said to the youth, "come
you in!"

Swithin looked at them askance, and followed. By a dim light they groped
their way up some stairs into a large room, into which the moon was
shining through a window bulging over the street. A lamp burned low;
there was a smell of spirits and tobacco, with a faint, peculiar scent,
as of rose leaves. In one corner stood a czymbal, in another a great
pile of newspapers. On the wall hung some old-fashioned pistols, and a
rosary of yellow beads. Everything was tidily arranged, but dusty. Near
an open fireplace was a table with the remains of a meal. The ceiling,
floor, and walls were all of dark wood. In spite of the strange
disharmony, the room had a sort of refinement. The Hungarian took
a bottle out of a cupboard and, filling some glasses, handed one to
Swithin. Swithin put it gingerly to his nose. 'You never know your luck!
Come!' he thought, tilting it slowly into his mouth. It was thick, too
sweet, but of a fine flavour.

"Brothers!" said the Hungarian, refilling, "your healths!"

The youth tossed off his wine. And Swithin this time did the same; he
pitied this poor devil of a youth now. "Come round to-morrow!" he said,
"I'll give you a shirt or two." When the youth was gone, however, he
remembered with relief that he had not given his address.

'Better so,' he reflected. 'A humbug, no doubt.'

"What was that you said to him?" he asked of the Hungarian.

"I said," answered Boleskey, "'You have eaten and drunk; and now you are
my enemy!'"

"Quite right!" said Swithin, "quite right! A beggar is every man's
enemy."

"You do not understand," the Hungarian replied politely. "While he was
a beggar--I, too, have had to beg" (Swithin thought, 'Good God! this is
awful!'), "but now that he is no longer hungry, what is he but a German?
No Austrian dog soils my floors!"

His nostrils, as it seemed to Swithin, had distended in an unpleasant
fashion; and a wholly unnecessary raucousness invaded his voice. "I
am an exile--all of my blood a