"Left? Where did she go, mon ami?" He and Monsieur Jacques were good friends, and Paul knew that his interest, though perhaps unaccountable to the old inn-keeper, was still in safe hands.

"That I do not know. But we shall see what we shall see. One moment, Monsieur."

Calling a porter, the maître d'hotel gesticulated with him for a moment.[79] Then he returned to where Paul waited impatiently.

[79]

"Emil here says that he purchased bookings to Langres for the lady," he said.

Langres! Isabella and London were a million miles from Langres at that instant! The memory of that kiss alone remained.

Paul's mind was made up. He would start for Langres that very day. He hurried to his rooms, where Baxter was soon packing his boxes. And then Paul's eye fell on the table, on the picture of Isabella that he had brought with him. She had given him an excellent likeness, in a leather case, the day he came away. Her frank eyes seemed to smile at him amusedly.

Paul pulled himself together.

"I am mad!" he told himself—"to be[80] carried away by a momentary impulse, to forget all for a fancied resemblance!... Paris! Baxter!" he said curtly, turning to his valet.

[80]

And when Paul reached the station it was with the firmest of resolutions to hurry home, stopping only one night in Paris to break the tiresome journey.

"En voiture!" the guards sang out, and Paul climbed into his carriage, once more the staid M. P. he thought—But was he? Could he ever be again?

Toward Paris, then, the fast mail bore him rapidly; and at the same time toward Langres. When they reached Bâle, Baxter telegraphed to the Hôtel du Rhin in Paris for a suite. At Belfort Paul directed him to send another message cancelling the reservation. And—alas for Paul's good resolutions!—at the station of[81] Langres-Marne, a mile from the old cathedral town itself, he left the train, taking only a big Gladstone bag with him, and sent Baxter on alone to Paris, to wait until he should arrive.

[81]

Another short journey remained, so in company with the inevitable soldier, priest, and old lady with a huge umbrella, Paul took a seat in one of the open cars of the little 

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