lowering his voice. "I'm off. I shall abandon you to him. He's a good old soul, but he bores me." Hartley nodded to the man who was approaching, and then made his way to the end of the table, where their host sat discussing aero-club matters with a group of the other men.

Captain Stewart dropped into the vacant chair, saying: "May I recall myself to you, M. Ste. Marie? We met, I believe, once or twice, a couple of years ago. My name's Stewart."

Captain Stewart--the title was vaguely believed to have been borne some years before in the American service, but no one appeared to know much about it--was not an old man. He could not have been, at this time, much more than fifty, but English-speaking acquaintances often called him "old Stewart," and others "ce vieux Stewart." Indeed, at a first glance he might have passed for anything up to sixty, for his face was a good deal more lined and wrinkled than it should have been at his age. Ste. Marie's adjective had been rather apt. The man had a desiccated appearance. Upon examination, however, one saw that the blood was still red in his cheeks and lips, and, although his neck was thin and withered like an old man's, his brown eyes still held their fire. The hair was almost gone from the top of his large, round head, but it remained at the sides--stiff, colorless hair, with a hint of red in it. And there were red streaks in his gray mustache, which was trained outward in two loose tufts, like shaving-brushes. The mustache and the shallow chin under it gave him an odd, catlike appearance. Hartley, who rather disliked the man, used to insist that he had heard him mew.

Ste. Marie said something politely non-committal, though he did not at all remember the alleged meeting two years before, and he looked at Captain Stewart with a real curiosity and interest in his character as Miss Benham's uncle. He thought it very civil of the elder man to make these friendly advances when it was in no way incumbent upon him to do so.

"I noticed," said Captain Stewart, "that you were placed next my niece, Helen Benham, at dinner. This must be the first time you two have met, is it not? I remember speaking of you to her some months ago, and I am quite sure she said that she had not met you. Ah, yes, of course, you have been away from Paris a great deal since she and her mother--her mother is my sister: that is to say, my half-sister--have come here to live with my father." He gave a little gentle laugh. "I take an elderly uncle's privilege," he said, "of being rather proud of Helen. She is called very pretty, and she certainly has great 

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