tter of fact."

"They must keep open very late at your shop," she remarked.

He hesitated a moment before he answered, "Very late."

"And I suppose you haven't dined?" she went on. "You must come back with
me, and dine at the hotel. I cannot go on to the party now, at any rate;
my clothes are in rags, and, besides, it must be quite late."

"Do you know your way back to the hotel?" he asked, as the time went on
and the jampannis remained, to all appearance, as dead as ever.

"No, I have never walked down this way, and it is far too dark to
attempt it now," said Elma very decidedly.

The time passed pleasantly enough while they waited, and more than once
their light-hearted laughter rang out into the night.

At last they heard a pattering of bare feet coming down the road. The
stranger hailed in Hindustani, and the natives stopped and began an
excited jabbering all together, which the stranger answered in their own
language.

"These are the jampannis who were killed," he announced to Elma. "If you
wish it, I will send one of them with a message to your mother, and the
others can fetch a couple of jampans to take us to the hotel."

"You seem to know Hindustani very well," she remarked, when the men had
been sent on their various errands.

"Yes, I have been some little time in India," he answered, "though I
have only been a few days at Simla. Will you allow me to introduce
myself? My name is Angus McIvor."

"And I am Elma Macdonald. I hope we shall not meet any one at the hotel
before I can get to my room. Oh! and will you let me go on in front, and
get out before you come?--I am so dreadfully tattered and torn."

"I promise not to look at you at all until you give me leave," he
answered gravely. "And what about me? I have lost my hat, and as yet I
have no idea of the extent of the damage my garments have sustained."

"Then I won't look at you either," said Elma, and they laughed together
again in the gayest _camaraderie_.

Dinner was over at the Bellevue when they got back there; but they
neither of them felt the want of other company. They had a very merry
little dinner-party all to themselves, and Angus was able to look at the
damsel errant he had rescued. Her beauty came upon him with a shock of
surprise. He had seen many beautiful women in his time, but never
anything so enchanting as the droop of her mouth, or the lovely curves
of her throat, or the transparent candour of her sweet blue eyes.

What El