We shall push on, unless we're snowed in," I said.

"That's our plan, too. I dare say we shall be starting about the same
time, and if so, if you don't mind, we might join forces."

"Now, what is this chap's game?" I asked myself. "He isn't drawing me
out for nothing; and as these two are together they have no need of
companionship. There's some special reason why they want to join us."

Taking this for granted, the one reason which occurred to me as
probable, was a previous acquaintance with the Boy, which they wished
to keep up, and he did not wish to acknowledge. I determined that he
should not be thus entrapped, through me.

"That would be very pleasant, no doubt," I replied; "but you had
better not wait for us. Our time of starting is uncertain."

Though I spoke with perfect civility, it must have been clear to them
that I preferred not to have my party enlarged by strangers, and I
rather regretted the necessity for this ungraciousness, as the men
were gentlemen, and I usually got on excellently with Americans.

"Oh, very well," returned the handsomer of the two, looking slightly
offended. "We shall meet on the way down, perhaps. By-the-by, if I'm
not mistaken, your young friend is a compatriot of ours. He's
American, isn't he?"

"Yes."

"I believe I've met him in New York, though it was so dark I couldn't
be sure. Do you object to telling me his name?"

"I'm afraid I do object," I answered, stiffly this time. "You must
satisfy yourself as to his identity, if it interests you, when you see
each other to-morrow."

Of all that remained of dinner, I can only say the words which Hamlet
spoke in dying; for indeed, "the rest was silence."

Directly the meal was over, I hurried back to the hotel, like a rabbit
to its warren; smoked a pipe before a roaring fire in my bedroom, and
wondered if the Little Pal were wandering "down the uncompanioned way"
of dreamland. As for me, I never got as far as that land. I fell over
a precipice without a bottom, before my head had found a nest in the
soft pillow, and knew nothing more until suddenly I started awake
with the impression that someone had called.

"What is it, Boy? Do you want me?" I heard myself asking sharply, as
my eyes opened.

It seemed that I had not been asleep for ten minutes, but to my
surprise an exquisite, rosy light filled the room. Well-nigh before I
knew whether I were sleeping or waking, I was out of bed and at the
window.

It was the light o