ong already. I shall
be quite safe here."

"You are not detaining me," he answered. "I have nothing to do.
Besides, I could not think of leaving you until I have seen you safely
on your way back to your hotel. Have you been in Merok very long?"

"Scarcely a week," the girl replied. "We came from Hellesylt."

Browne wondered of whom the _we_ might consist. Was the girl married?
He tried to discover whether or not she wore a wedding-ring, but her
hand was hidden in the folds her dress.

Five minutes later a cabriole made its appearance, drawn by a shaggy
pony and led by a villager. Behind it, and considerably out of breath,
toiled a stout and elderly lady, who, as soon as she saw the girl
seated on the bank by the roadside, burst into a torrent of speech.

"Russian," said Brown to himself; "her accent puzzled me, but now I
understand."

Then turning to the young man, who was experiencing some slight
embarrassment at being present at what his instinct told him was a
wigging, administered by a lady who was plainly a past mistress at the
art, the girl said in English:--

"Permit me to introduce you to my guardian, Madame Bernstein."

The couple bowed ceremoniously to each other, and then Browne and the
villager between them lifted the girl into the vehicle, the man took
his place at the pony's head, and the strange cortege proceeded on its
way down the hill towards the hotel. Once there, Browne prepared to
take leave of them. He held out his hand to the girl, who took it.

"Good-bye," he said. "I hope it will not be long before you are able
to get about once more."

"Good-bye," she answered; and then, with great seriousness, "Pray,
believe that I shall always be grateful to you for the service you have
rendered me this afternoon."

There was a little pause. Then, with a nervousness that was by no
means usual to him, he added:--

"I hope you will not think me rude, but perhaps you would not mind
telling me whom I have had the pleasure of helping?"

"My name is Katherine Petrovitch," she answered, with a smile, and then
as frankly returned his question. "And yours?"

"My name is Browne," he replied; and also smiling as he said it, he
added: "I am Browne's Mimosa Soap, Fragrant and Antiseptic."

CHAPTER II

When Browne reached the yacht, after bidding good-bye to the girl he
had rescued, he found his friends much exercised in their minds
concerning him. They had themselves been overtaken by