lit pavement without--evidently the
door through which the mother and the Cure had just passed out. He ran
rapidly towards it. As he did so he heard the hurried ringing of bells
and voices in the room he had quitted--the young girl had evidently
been discovered--and this would give him time. He had nearly reached the
door, when he stopped suddenly--his blood chilled with awe! It was his
turn to be terrified--he was standing, apparently, before HIMSELF!

His first recovering thought was that it was a mirror--so accurately
was every line and detail of his face and figure reflected. But a second
scrutiny showed some discrepancies of costume, and he saw it was a
panelled portrait on the wall. It was of a man of his own age, height,
beard, complexion, and features, with long curls like his own, falling
over a lace Van Dyke collar, which, however, again simulated the
appearance of his own hunting-shirt. The broad-brimmed hat in the
picture, whose drooping plume was lost in shadow, was scarcely
different from Dick's sombrero. But the likeness of the face to Dick was
marvelous--convincing! As he gazed at it, the wicked black eyes seemed
to flash and kindle at his own,--its lip curled with Dick's own sardonic
humor!

He was recalled to himself by a step in the gallery. It was the Cure who
had entered hastily, evidently in search of one of the servants.
Partly because it was a man and not a woman, partly from a feeling of
bravado--and partly from a strange sense, excited by the picture, that
he had some claim to be there, he turned and faced the pale priest with
a slight dash of impatient devilry that would have done credit to the
portrait. But he was sorry for it the next moment!

The priest, looking up suddenly, discovered what seemed to him to be the
portrait standing before its own frame and glaring at him. Throwing
up his hands with an averted head and an "EXORCIS--!" he wheeled and
scuffled away. Dick seized the opportunity, darted through the narrow
door on to the rear terrace, and ran, under cover of the shadow of
the house, to the steps into the garden. Luckily for him, this new and
unexpected diversion occupied the inmates too much with what was going
on in the house to give them time to search outside. Dick reached the
lilac hedge, tore up the hill, and in a few moments threw himself,
panting, on his blanket. In the single look he had cast behind, he had
seen that the half-dark salon was now brilliantly lighted--wher