of my kind in Paris till I had
not a louis to my credit. Lord! the old days, the old days! I should be
penitent, I daresay, M. Montaiglon, but I'm putting that off till I find
that a sober life has compensations for the entertainment of a life of
liberty."

"Did you know Balhaldie?"

"Do I know the inside of my own pocket! I've played piquet wi' the
old rogue a score of times in the Sun tavern of Rotterdam. Pardon me
speaking that way of one that may be an intimate of your own, but to be
quite honest, the Scots gentlemen living on the Scots Fund in France in
these days were what I call the scourings of the Hielan's. There were
good and bad among them, of course, but I was there in the _entourage_
of one who was no politician, which was just my own case, and I saw
but the convivial of my exiled countrymen in their convivial hours.
Politics! In these days I would scunner at the very word, if you know
what that means, M. Montaiglon. I was too throng with gaiety to trouble
my head about such trifles; my time was too much taken up with buckling
my hair, in admiring the cut of my laced _jabot_, and the Mechlin of my
wrist-bands."

They were walking close upon the sea-wall with leisurely steps,
preoccupied, the head of the little town, it seemed, wholly surrendered
to themselves alone. Into the Chamberlain's voice had come an accent
of the utmost friendliness and flattering ir-restraint; he seemed to be
leaving his heart bare to the Frenchman. Count Victor was by these
last words transported to his native city, and his own far-off days of
galliard. Why, in the name of Heaven! was he here listening to hackneyed
tales of domestic tragedy and a stranger's reminiscences? Why did
his mind continually linger round the rock of Doom, so noisy on its
promontory, so sad, so stern, so like an ancient saga in its spirit?
Cecile--he was amazed at it, but Cecile, and the Jacobite cause he had
come here to avenge with a youth's ardour, had both fallen, as it were,
into a dusk of memory!

"By the way, monsieur, you did not happen to have come upon any one
remotely suggesting my Drimdarroch in the course of your travels?"

"Oh, come!" cried Sim MacTaggart; "if I did, was I like to mention
it here and now?" He laughed at the idea. "You have not grasped the
clannishness of us yet if you fancy--"

"But in an affair of strict honour, monsieur," broke in Count Victor
eagerly. "Figure you a woman basely betrayed; your admirable sentiments
re