y. "When must I do it?"

"Now--at once. The sooner the better. He usually goes to the bower at
the foot of the garden after breakfast."

Without a word, but with a glance that spoke volumes, the maiden ran to
the bower.

What she said to the Frenchman we need not write down in detail. It is
sufficient to note the result. In the course of a short time after she
had entered the bower, a loud shout was heard, and next moment Laronde
was seen rushing towards the house with a flushed countenance and the
vigour of an athlete!

"My little girl has been too precipitate, I fear," remarked Hugh Sommers
to the middy.

"Your little girl is never `_too_'--anything!" replied the middy to
Hugh, with much gravity.

The ex-Bagnio slave smiled, but whether at the reply or at the rushing
Frenchman we cannot tell.

When Laronde reached his room he found Peter the Great there, on his
knees, packing a small valise.

"Hallo! Peter, what are you doing? I want that."

"Yes, Eddard, I know dat. Das why I's packin'."

"You're a good fellow, Peter, a true friend, but let me do it; I'm in
terrible haste!"

"No, sar, you's not in haste. Dere's lots ob time." (He pulled out a
watch of the warming-pan type and consulted it.) "De coach don't start
till one o'clock; it's now eleben; so dere's no hurry. You jest lie
down on de bed an' I'll pack de bag."

Instead of lying down the poor Frenchman fell on his knees beside the
bed and laid his face in his hands.

"Yes--das better. Dere's some sense in _dat_," muttered the negro as he
quietly continued to pack the valise.

Two hours later and Laronde was dashing across country as fast as four
good horses could take him, with George Foster on one side, Peter the
Great on the other, and Brown on the box-seat--the fo'c'sl, he called
it--beside the red-coated driver.

Whatever may be true of your modern forty-mile-an-hour iron horse, there
can be no question that the ten-mile-an-hour of those days, behind a
spanking team with clattering wheels, and swaying springs, and cracking
whip, and sounding horn, _felt_ uncommonly swift and satisfactory.
Laronde shut his eyes and enjoyed it at first. But the strength
engendered by excitement soon began to fail. The long weary journey
helped to make things worse, and when at last they arrived at the
journey's end, and went with Miss Love and Minnie to the lodging, poor
Laronde had scarcely strength left to totter to his wife's bedside.
This