nfronted with a girl in a cool gown that
is perfumed by blossoms pure and spotless and fragrant as the
young breast that crushes them.

So when he had found old Pierre and had followed him to a
bath-room, the water that washed the stains from brow and wrist
seemed also to purify the stain that is popularly supposed to
resist earthly ablutions. A clean body and a clean conscience is
not a proverb, but there are, perhaps, worse maxims in the world.

When he dried his face and looked into a mirror, his sins had
dwindled a bit; when Pierre dusted his clothes and polished his
spurs and boots, life assumed a brighter aspect. Fatigue, too, came
to dull that busybody--that tireless, gossiping gadabout--conscience.
Fatigue and remorse are enemies; slumber and the white flag of sleep
stand truce between them.

"Pierre," he said; "get a dog-cart; I am going to drive to
Morteyn. You will find me in the arbour on the lawn. Is the
marquis visible?"

"No, Monsieur Jack, he is still locked up in the turret."

"And the balloon?"

"Dame! Je n'en sais rien, monsieur."

So Jack walked down-stairs and out through the porch to the lawn,
where he saw Lorraine already seated in the arbour, placing the
long-stemmed lilies in gilded bowls.

"It will be dark soon," he said, stepping up beside her. "Thank
you for being good to my horse. Is it more than a scratch?"

"No--it is nothing. The horse shall stand in our stable until
to-morrow. Are you very tired? Sit beside me. Do you care to tell
me anything of what you did?"

"Do you care to know?"

"Of course," she said.

So he told her; not all, however--not of that ride and the chase
and the shots from the saddle. But he spoke of the Emperor and
the distant battle that had seemed like a scene in a painted
landscape. He told her, too, of Georges Carriere.

"Why, I know him," she said, brightening with pleasure; "he is
charming--isn't he?"

"Why, yes," said Jack; but for all he tried his voice sounded
coldly.

"Don't you think so?" asked Lorraine, opening her blue eyes.

Again he tried to speak warmly of the friend he was really fond
of, and again he felt that he had failed. Why? He would not ask
himself--but he knew. This shamed him, and he began an elaborate
eulogy on poor Georges, conscientious, self-effacing, but very,
very unsatisfactory.

The maid beside him listened demurely. She also knew things that
she had not known a week ago. That possibly is why, like a little
bi