en with another of his bilious attacks, I
hope, madam?" said Mrs. Forbes.

Mrs. Greyne smiled. The ignorance of the humbly born entertained her. It
was so simple, so transparent.

"You fail to understand me," she answered. "But never mind; others have
done the same."

She thought of her reviewers. Mrs. Forbes smiled. She also could be
entertained.

"Madam?" she inquired once more after a pause.

"I shall leave for Africa to-morrow morning," said Mrs. Greyne. "You
will accompany me."

There was a dead silence.

"You will accompany me. Do you understand? Obtain assistance from
the housemaids in the packing. Select my quietest gowns, my least
conspicuous bonnets. I have my reasons for wishing, while journeying to
Africa and remaining there, to pass, if possible, unnoticed."

Again there was a pause. Mrs. Greyne looked up at Mrs. Forbes, and
observed a dogged expression upon her countenance.

"What is the matter?" she asked the maid.

"Do we go by Paris, madam?" said Mrs. Forbes.

"Certainly."

"Then, madam, I'm very sorry, but I couldn't risk it, not if it was ever
so----"

"Why not? Why this fear of Lutetia?"

"Madam, I'm not afraid of any Lutetia as ever wore apron, but to go
to Paris to be drugged with absint, and put away in a third-class
waiting-room like a package--I couldn't madam, not even if I have to
leave your service."

Mrs. Greyne recognised that the episode of the valet had struck home to
the lady's maid.

"But you will not leave my side."

"They will absint you, madam."

"But you will travel first in a sleeping-car."

Mrs. Forbes put up her hand to her pork-pie cap, as if considering.

"Very well, madam, to oblige you I will undergo it," she said at length.
"But I would not do the like for another living lady."

"I will raise your wages. You are a faithful creature."

"Does master expect us, madam?" asked Mrs. Forbes as she prepared to
retire.

A bright and tender look stole into Mrs. Greyne's intellectual face.

"No," she replied.

She turned her large and beaming eyes full upon the maid.

"Mrs. Forbes," she said, with an amount of emotion that was very rare in
her, "I am going to tell you a great truth."

"Madam?" said Mrs. Forbes respectfully.

"The sweetest moments of life, those which lift man nearest heaven, and
make him thankful for the great gift of existence, are sometimes those
which are unforeseen."

She was thinking of Mr. Greyne's ecstasy when, upon the in