the other day; he would do anything
for me.'

'He called to you in the night?' said Lyon, much startled.

'That's the interesting point. Now _what was it_? It wasn't his ghost,
because he wasn't dead. It wasn't himself, because he couldn't. It was
something or other! You see India's a strange country--there's an
element of the mysterious: the air is full of things you can't explain.'

They passed out of the dining-room, and Colonel Capadose, who went among
the first, was separated from Lyon; but a minute later, before they
reached the drawing-room, he joined him again. 'Ashmore tells me who you
are. Of course I have often heard of you--I'm very glad to make your
acquaintance; my wife used to know you.'

'I'm glad she remembers me. I recognised her at dinner and I was afraid
she didn't.'

'Ah, I daresay she was ashamed,' said the Colonel, with indulgent
humour.

'Ashamed of me?' Lyon replied, in the same key.

'Wasn't there something about a picture? Yes; you painted her portrait.'

'Many times,' said the artist; 'and she may very well have been ashamed
of what I made of her.'

'Well, I wasn't, my dear sir; it was the sight of that picture, which
you were so good as to present to her, that made me first fall in love
with her.'

'Do you mean that one with the children--cutting bread and butter?'

'Bread and butter? Bless me, no--vine leaves and a leopard skin--a kind
of Bacchante.'

'Ah, yes,' said Lyon; 'I remember. It was the first decent portrait I
painted. I should be curious to see it to-day.'

'Don't ask her to show it to you--she'll be mortified!' the Colonel
exclaimed.

'Mortified?'

'We parted with it--in the most disinterested manner,' he laughed. 'An
old friend of my wife's--her family had known him intimately when they
lived in Germany--took the most extraordinary fancy to it: the Grand
Duke of Silberstadt-Schreckenstein, don't you know? He came out to
Bombay while we were there and he spotted your picture (you know he's
one of the greatest collectors in Europe), and made such eyes at it
that, upon my word--it happened to be his birthday--she told him he
might have it, to get rid of him. He was perfectly enchanted--but we
miss the picture.'

'It is very good of you,' Lyon said. 'If it's in a great collection--a
work of my incompetent youth--I am infinitely honoured.'

'Oh, he has got it in one of his castles; I don't know which--you know
he has so many. He sent us, before he left India--