Barnard; and then poor Calvert, horrified at his
friend's fate—"

Calvert never waited for more. He saw that
there was that amount of mistake and
misunderstanding, which required no aid on his part, and
now nothing remained but to present himself
suddenly before them as a fugitive from justice,
seeking shelter and protection. The rest he
was content to leave to hazard.

A sharp ring at the door-bell was scarcely
answered by the servant, when the man came
to the drawing-room door, and made a sign to
Miss Grainger.

"What is it, Giacomo? What do you mean?"
she cried.

"Just one moment, signora; half a minute
here," he said.

Well accustomed to the tone of secresy
assumed by Italians on occasions the least important,
Miss Grainger followed him outside, and
there, under the glare of the hall-lamp, stood
Calvert, pale, his hair dishevelled, his cravat
loosened, and his coat-sleeve torn. "Save me!
hide me!" said he, in a low whisper. "Can
you—will you save me?"

She was one not unfitted to meet a sudden
change; and, although secretly shocked, she
rallied quickly, and led him into a room beside
the hall. "I know all," said she. "We all
knew it was your name."

"Can you conceal me here for a day—two
days at furthest?"

"A week, if you need it."

"And the servant—can he be trusted?"

"To the death. I'll answer for him."

"How can you keep the secret from the
girls?"

"I need not; they must know everything."

"But Florence; can she—has she forgiven
me?"

"Yes, thoroughly. She scarcely knows about
what she quarrelled with you. She sometimes
fears that she wronged you; and Milly defends
you always."

"You have heard—you know what has
happened to me?"

"In a fashion; that is, we only know there
has been a duel. We feared you had been
wounded; and, indeed, we heard severely
wounded."

"The story is too long to tell you now;
enough, if I say it was all about Sophy. You
remember Sophy, and a fellow who was to have
married her, and who jilted her; and not only
this, but boasted of the injury he had done her,
and the insult he had thrown on us. A friend
of mine, Barnard, a brother-officer, heard him—
but why go on with this detail?—there was a
quarrel and a challenge, and it was by merest
accident I heard of it, and reached Basle in time.
Of course, I was not going to leave to Barnard
what of right belonged to me. There were, as
you can imagine, innumerable complications in
the matter. Rochefort, the other man's friend,
and a French fellow, insisted on having a finger
in the pie. The end of it was, I shot Graham;
and somebody else—I believe Rochefort—put
a bullet into Barnard. The Swiss laws in some
cantons are severe, and we only learned too late
that we had fought in the very worst of them; so
I ran, I don't know how, or in what direction.
I lost my head for a while, and wandered about
the Vorarlberg and the Splugen for a week or
two. How I find myself now here is quite a
mystery to me."

There was a haggard wildness in his look
that fully accorded with all he said, and the
old lady felt the most honest pity for his sufferings.

"I don't know if I am perfectly safe here,"
said he, looking fearfully around him. " Are you
sure you can conceal me, if need be?"

"Quite sure; have no fear about that. I'll
tell the girls that your safety requires the greatest
caution and secresy, and you'll see how careful
they will be."

"Girls will talk, though," said he, doubtingly.

"There is the double security here—they
have no one to talk to," she said, with a faint
smile.

"Very true. I was forgetting how retired
your life was here. Now, for the next point.
What are you to tell them—I mean, how much
are they to know?"

The old lady looked puzzled; she felt she
might easily have replied, "If they only know
no more than I can tell them, your secret will
certainly be safe;" but, as she looked at his
haggard cheek and feverish eye, she shrunk from
renewing a theme full of distress and suffering.
"Leave it to me to say something—
anything which shall show them that you are in a
serious trouble, and require all their secresy and
sympathy."

"Yes, that may do—at least for the present.
It will do at least with Emily, who bears me no
ill will."

"You wrong Florence if you imagine that she
does. It was only the other day, when, in a
letter from Loyd, she read that you had left the
army, she said how sorry she was you had quitted
the career so suited to your abilities."

"Indeed! I scarce hoped for so much of
interest in me."

"Oh, she talks continually about you; and
always as of one, who only needs the guidance of
some true friend to be a man of mark and
distinction yet."

"It is very good, very kind of her," he said;
and, for an instant, seemed lost in thought.

"I'll go back now," said Miss Grainger, "and
prepare them for your coming. They'll wonder
what has detained me all this while. Wait one
moment for me here."

Calvert, apparently, was too much engaged
with his own thoughts to hear her, and suffered
her to go without a word. She was quickly
back again, and beckoning him to follow her,
led the way to the drawing-room.

Scarcely had Calvert passed the doorway,
when the two girls met him, and each taking a
hand, conducted him without a word to a sofa.
Indeed, his sickly look, and the air of downright