Nathaniel looked at me briefly over his shoulder and as briefly answered, “No.”

The next night I took him to a play; but two nights later, the night before we were to depart, Nathaniel again escaped me while I superintended the packing of our specie, and again he disappeared. This time I knew with whom he was engaged; and I was in a ferment, but not at all surprised, when he was absent on this private business until four in the morning. He was flushed when he came back: a little excited; but beyond what showed in his face, he kept his feelings to himself. Not a word would he say to me.

My only feeling was one of thankfulness: thankfulness that we were leaving; for if ever I had seen a woman who seemed to me as dangerous as she was fascinating, it was Marie de Sabrevois.

*    *    *

… I was glad indeed when, a few hours later, our breakfast eaten and our belongings packed, there was a noisy whipcracking and clattering outside our lodgings. Here at last, I said to myself, was Mr. Leonard, bringing the means of escape from the blue-eyed girl who, in four short days, had made herself so ominous a part of our lives.

When I threw up the sash to look down into the street, my gladness was abruptly tempered; for two conveyances stood before our door. One was a dark green post chaise which must, of course, be Mr. Leonard’s; but behind it stood an empty sedan chair that had a fluffy and feminine look about it.

It was no surprise, therefore, when Nathaniel, uttering a muffled exclamation, turned from the window and ran from the room, and when I saw, close beside the placid, olive-tinted visage of Mr. Leonard at the window of the chaise, the pretty face of Marie de Sabrevois.

When the hustle and bustle of our departure was mostly over, and the driver and postilion had lashed our heavy boxes to the rack, she emerged from the chaise, a dainty perfumed figure in blue velvet and brown fur, and bade us farewell then and there, kissing her uncle affectionately and looking up at us pathetically from under the fur that fringed her blue velvet bonnet. Her good-byes to me were cordial enough; but there was more than cordiality in the way her little hand lingered in Nathaniel’s, and her eyes clung to his.