that he was minded to keep.

"To think," he exclaimed, pointing a scornful finger at the village
across the river, "that but for my luck I might be at the inn! Heaven
above us, I might even have been leaving this enchanting spot!" He
looked down at the stream. A man was fishing there, a tall, well-made
fellow in knickerbockers and a soft felt hat of the sort sometimes
called Tyrolean. "Good luck to you, my boy!" nodded the happy and
therefore charitable Captain.

Going down to the Count's pleasant room at the corner of the left wing,
he found his host taking his coffee. Compliments passed, and soon
Dieppe was promising to spend a week at least with his new friend.

"I am a student," observed the Count, "and you must amuse yourself.
There are fine walks, a little rough shooting perhaps--"

"Fishing?" asked Dieppe, thinking of the man in the soft hat.

"The fishing is worth nothing at all," answered the Count, decisively.
He paused for a moment and then went on: "There is, however, one
request that I am obliged to make to you."

"Any wish of yours is a command to me, my dear host."

"It is that during your visit you will hold no communication whatever
with the right wing of the house." The Count was now lighting a cigar;
he completed the operation carefully, and then added:

"The Countess's establishment and mine are entirely separate--entirely."

"The Countess!" exclaimed Dieppe, not unnaturally surprised.

"I regret to trouble you with family matters. My wife and I are not in
agreement; we have n't met for three months. She lives in the right
wing with two servants; I live in the left with three. We hold no
communication, and our servants are forbidden to hold any among
themselves; obedience is easier to insure as we have kept only those we
can trust, and, since entertaining is out of the question, have
dismissed the rest."

"You have--er--had a difference?" the Captain ventured to suggest, for
the Count seemed rather embarrassed.

"A final and insuperable difference, a final and permanent separation."
The Count's tone was sad but very firm.

"I am truly grieved. But--forgive me--does n't the arrangement you
indicate entail some inconvenience?"

"Endless inconvenience," assented the Count.

"To live under the same roof, and yet--"

"My dear sir, during the negotiations which followed on the Countess's
refusal to--to well, to meet my wishes, I represented that to her with
all the emphasis at