er seen her ancestral home, for her father
lived a nomadic existence on the Continent; one which she had shared,
since she left the school at Neuilly, where she and Mary first became
friends.

I gathered that she and her father were devoted to each other; and that
he had spared her unwillingly for this long-promised visit to her old
school-fellow. Mary, I knew, would have welcomed Mr. Pendennis also; but
by all accounts he was an eccentric person, who preferred to live
anywhere rather than in England, the land of his birth. He and Anne were
birds of passage, who wintered in Italy or Spain or Egypt as the whim
seized him; and spent the summer in Switzerland or Tyrol, or elsewhere.
In brief they wandered over Europe, north and south, according to the
season; avoiding only the Russian Empire and the British Isles.

I had never worried my mind with conjectures as to the reason of this
unconventional mode of living. It had seemed to me natural enough, as I,
too, was a nomad; a stranger and sojourner in many lands, since I left
the old homestead in Iowa twelve years ago, to seek my fortune in the
great world. During these wonderful weeks I had been spellbound, as it
were, by Anne's beauty, her charm. When I was with her I could think
only of her; and in the intervals,--well, I still thought of her, and
was dejected or elated as she had been cruel or kind. To me her many
caprices had seemed but the outcome of her youthful light-heartedness;
of a certain naive coquetry, that rendered her all the more dear and
desirable; "a rosebud set about with little wilful thorns;" a girl who
would not be easily wooed and won, and, therefore, a girl well worth
winning.

But now--now--I saw her from a different standpoint; saw her enshrouded
in a dark mystery, the clue to which eluded me. Only one belief I clung
to with passionate conviction, as a drowning man clings to a straw. She
loved me. I could not doubt that, remembering the expression of her
wistful face as we parted under the portico so short a time ago, though
it seemed like a lifetime. Had she planned her flight even then,--if
flight it was,--and what else could it be?

My cogitations terminated abruptly for the moment as a heavy hand was
laid on my shoulder, and a gruff voice said in my ear: "Come, none o'
that, now! What are you up to?"

I turned and faced a burly policeman, whom I knew well. He recognized
me, also, and saluted.

"Beg pardon; didn't know it was you, sir. T