hile his heart beat
faster, for the writing was, "_Expect me. Rub this out. H.S_."

What could this mean? H.S? Hester Sommers of course. It was simple--
too simple. He wished for more--like the gazelle. Like it, too, he got
no more. After gazing at the writing, until every letter was burnt into
his memory, he obeyed the order and rubbed it out. Then, in a disturbed
and anxious frame of mind, he tried to paint, casting many a glance, not
only at his subject, but at the two doors which opened into the room.

At last one of the doors opened--not the one he happened to be looking
at, however. He started up, overturned his stool, and all but knocked
down the easel, as the negress re-entered to remove the
refreshment-tray. She called to the gazelle as she went out. It
bounded lightly after her, and the young painter was left alone to
recover his composure.

"Ass that I am!" he said, knitting his brows, clenching his teeth, and
putting a heavy dab of crimson-lake on the ceiling!

At that moment the other door opened, yet so gently and slightly that he
would not have observed it but for the sharp line of light which it let
through. Determined not to be again taken by surprise, he became
absorbed in putting little unmeaning lines round the dab of lake--not so
busily, however, as to prevent his casting rapid furtive glances at the
opening door.

Gradually something white appeared in the aperture--it was a veil.
Something blue--it was an eye. Something quite beyond description
lovely--it was Hester herself, looking--if such be conceivable--like a
scared angel!

"Oh, Mr Foster!" she exclaimed, in a half-whisper, running lightly in,
and holding up a finger by way of caution, "I have so longed to see
you--"

"So have I," interrupted the delighted middy. "Dear H---ah--Miss
Sommers, I mean, I felt sure that--that--this _must_ be your room--no,
what's its name? boudoir; and the gazelle--"

"Yes, yes--oh! never mind that," interrupted the girl impatiently. "My
father--darling father!--any news of _him_."

Blushing with shame that he should have thought of his own feelings
before her anxieties, Foster dropped the little hand which he had
already grasped, and hastened to tell of the meeting with her father in
the Kasba--the ease with which he had recognised him from her
description, and the few hurried words of comfort he had been able to
convey before the slave-driver interfered.

Tears were coursing each othe