at Rosina and she was sure that Jack would
notice it, and wished that he wouldn't. Then he gave a little start and
held out his hand.

"I shall not come to-night," he said, "and to-morrow I go to the
Tagernsee; so it is 'good-bye' here."

She felt choked.

"Good-bye," she said, keenly aware of being watched, but striving to
speak pleasantly notwithstanding. He shook her hand, raised his hat, and
left them.

Then her cousin swung the big _porte_ open and they entered the passage
and went towards the stairs. At the first step he paused and said in a
peculiarly pointed tone of voice:

"Well, are you going to marry him?"

She jumped at the suddenness of the question, and then, recovering
herself quickly, answered coldly:

"Of course not."

"Why of course not?"

Her neck took on a quite new poise--not new to the man behind her,
however.

"I asked you, 'Why of course not'?" he repeated.

"You know how foolish such a question is."

"It isn't foolish. Yourself considered, it's the most natural question
in the world."

"You never met me before when I was walking with a stranger, and then
asked me such a thing."

"This man's different. Some one wrote home that you were going to marry
him. You can imagine Uncle John! I was sent for from the beach and
shipped by the first thing that sailed after my arrival."

Rosina stopped on the first landing to stare in tranceful astonishment.

"Some one wrote!" she ejaculated faintly. "Who wrote?"

"Never you mind who wrote. Whoever it was set uncle thinking, and I was
posted off to look him up."

"When did you come over?"

"Landed in Hamburg the last of August."

"Where have you been ever since?"

"Been looking him up."

Rosina began to mount the second staircase; she appeared completely
bewildered.

"It's very nice of uncle," she said about the fourth step, "and of
course I'm awfully obliged to whoever wrote home; but I'm not going to
marry him, really."

Jack whistled.

"Well," he said cheerily, as they attained the second landing, "I know
all about him now, anyway; and if you ever do want to go ahead, you can
be sure that he's all right."

"I knew that he was all right," she said quietly; "every one in Europe
knows that he's all right."

"He's a first-class boxer, anyhow," the cousin declared. "Lord, what a
blow that was! And I did not mean to frighten you at all, either; I
thought that you saw me coming."

"How was I to know that it was you? I supp