me low haunt in
France, perhaps hide her away in Italy as a pretended invalid. The man
is mad--simply mad--about this baronetcy, and in some strange way the
girl stands between him and it. Do you promise?"

"I promise you all!" faltered the excited woman. "Let me go now. Let me
go home, Alan," she murmured, and there were no heart secrets between
them any more, as the blushing woman, still trembling with the audacity
of her own burning emotions, was led safely to the door of the jewel
mart.

"Be brave, be brave, dear Justine," he whispered. "Old Johnstone has
sent for me. You shall have your home yet; I guarantee it. I shall
be frequently at the house in the next few days. Remember to control
yourself, and to watch the sly game of this old brute. I will stay here
and send off at once our first letter to Euphrosyne. This girl will
have a million pounds. You and your sister must not be robbed of the
recompense of nearly twenty years of tenderness. Cleave to her, heart to
heart, and tell me all. I will make you both rich!"

"Trust me to the death! I understand all now," whispered Justine, her
breast heaving in a new and strange emotion, flooding her chilly veins
as with a subtle fiery elixir.

"Then go, but, dear one, be here two days from now at the same time.
Should any accident happen, Ram Lal will then come and bear to you my
message. You can trust him. I will stay here and send this registered
letter from here at once. Then, Hugh Johnstone has three loving
guardians to outwit before he can hide away your beautiful nursling!"

"For you." he softly whispered, as he slipped a little packet into her
hand, when she stole out of the shop, after Alan Hawke had judiciously
reconnoitered.

"Dear, simple soul!" contentedly reflected Major Hawke, as he busied
himself with the important letter to the staid Euphrosyne. "She has
given me her heart, in her loving eagerness to defend that child, and
the key to the whole situation. It would be just like this old brute
to spirit the girl away to baffle Madame Berthe Louison. That is, if he
dare not kill or intimidate her. And that I must look to. I think that
I see my way to that girl's side now. God, what a pot of money she will
have!"

When Alan Hawke had finished his boldly warm letter to Euphrosyne, he
sealed it and sent it to the post by Ram Lal's footman. The world looked
very bright to him as, enjoying a capital cheroot, he studied for a half
hour a wall map of India. "