all, if he would be cautious.

So he sallied out, and, in the midst of his fruitless inquisition, Millicent appeared.

Forcing a civil smile, he awaited her pleasure. “Go on, don’t mind me,” said she mournfully; “you will feel better to have done everything in your power.”

“But I shall not discover anything?”

“I fear not. Has it not occurred to you that he has been kidnapped?”

“Hmn!” said the colonel.

“And did you notice how perturbed Miss Smith[89] seemed? She was quite pale; her agitation was quite noticeable.”

[89]

“She is tremendously fond of Archie.”

“Or—she knows more than she will say.”

“Oh, what rot!” sputtered the colonel; then he begged her pardon.

“Wait,” he counseled, and his man’s resistance to appearances had its effect, as masculine immobility always has, on the feminine effervescence before him. “Wait,” was his word, “at least until we give the boy a chance to turn up; if he has slipped by us, he is taking a little pasear on his own account; lads do get restless sometimes if they are held too steadily in the leash, especially—if you will excuse me—by, well, by ladies.”

“If he has frightened us out of our wits—well, I don’t know what oughtn’t to be done to him!”

“Oh well, let us wait and hear his story,” repeated the soldier.

But the last streaks of red faded out of the west; a chill fog smoked up from the darkening hills, and Archie had not come. At eight, Mrs. Winter ordered dinner to be served in their rooms. Miss Smith had not returned. The colonel attempted a military cheerfulness, which his aunt told him bluntly, later in the evening, reminded[90] her of a physician’s manner in critical cases where the patient’s mind must be kept absolutely quiet.

[90]

But she ate more than he at dinner; although her 

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