ner room in due course, I saluted three uniformed men
who sat round an unimposing wooden table, exhibited the _vise_ that Jack
Herriott had secured for me at Genoa, and was welcomed to the land. Then
I stepped forth on the platform, retrieved my porter and my baggage, and
placed myself near the door to wait until the girl should come.

I must have been a grim sort of sentinel as I stood there watching. I
knew what I had to do, but I detested it with all my heart. There was
one thing to be said for this Miss Falconer--she had courage. She was
pressing on to French soil without lingering a day in Italy, though
she must be aware that by so swift a move she was risking suspicion,
discovery, death.

As moment after moment dragged past, I grew uneasy. Would she come out
at all? Could she win past those trained, keen-eyed men? The more I
thought of it, the more desperate seemed the game she was playing. This
little Alpine town, high among the peaks, surrounded by pines and snow,
had been a setting for tragedies since the war began. These territorials
with their muskets were not mere supers, either. But no! She was
emerging; she was starting toward the _rapide_. There, no doubt, a
reserved compartment was awaiting her, and once inside its shelter, she
would not appear again.

I drew a deep breath in which resolve and distaste were mingled. She had
crossed the frontier, but she was not in Paris yet. I couldn't shirk the
thing twice, knowing as I did her charm, her beauty, her air of proud,
spirited graciousness--all the tools that equipped her. I couldn't, if
I was ever again to hold my head before a Frenchman, let her pass on, so
daring and dangerous and resourceful, to do her work in France.

As she approached, I stepped in front of her, lifting my hat.

"This is a great surprise, Miss Falconer," said I.

CHAPTER X

DINNER FOR TWO

I was prepared for fear, for distress, for pleading as I confronted
Miss Falconer; the one thing I hadn't expected was that she should
seem pleased at the meeting, but she did. She flushed a little, smiled
brightly, and held out her gloved hand to me.

"Why, Mr. Bayne! I am so glad!" she exclaimed in frankly cordial tones.

The crass coolness of her tactics, with its implied rating of my
intelligence, was the very bracer I needed for a most unpleasant task. I
accepted her hand, bowed over it formally, and released it. Then I spoke
with the most impersonal courtesy in the world.

"An