-bye? I may not see you again."

There was a sadness in his smile bitterly significant to me, but very
likely she didn't see it, not having any key to it, as I had.

Violet turned pale, and I fancied her lips twitched, but it might be the
flickering of the light of the staircase lamps on her face. At any rate,
being a young lady born and bred in good society, she put her hand in
his, with a simple "What! are you going away?"

"Perhaps. At any rate, let us part in peace."

The proud man laughed as he said it, though he was enduring tortures.
Violet heard the laugh, and didn't see the straining anxiety in his
gaze.

She drew her hand rapidly away. "Certainly. _Bon voyage_, Major Telfer,
and good night," she answered, carelessly; and, with a graceful bend,
the Tressillian floated on up the stairs with the dignity of a young
empress.

Telfer looked after the white gossamer dress and the beautiful head,
with its wreath of scarlet flowers, and an iron sternness settled on his
face. All hope was gone now. She could not have parted with him like
this if she had cared for him one straw more than for the flowers in her
hair. Yet, in the morning, he was going to risk his life for her. Ah,
well! I've always seen that in love there's one of the two who gives all
and gets nothing.

In the morning, by five o'clock, in the valley of Koenigshoehle, a snug
bit of pasture land between two rocks, where no gendarme could pounce
upon us, young Snobley made his appearance to enjoy the honor of being
a target for one of the best shots in Europe. Snobley had a good deal of
swagger and would-be dash, and made a great show of pluck, which your
man of true pluck never does. Telfer stood talking to me up to the last
minute, took his pistol carelessly in his hand, and, without taking any
apparent aim, fired.

If Telfer made up his mind to shoot off your fifth waistcoat-button,
your fifth waistcoat-button would be irrevocably doomed; and therefore,
having determined to himself to lodge a bullet in this young puppy's
left wrist, in the left wrist did the ball lodge. Snobley was
"satisfied," very amply satisfied, I fancy, by his looks. He'd fired,
and sent his shot right into the trunk of a chestnut growing some seven
yards off his opponent, to Heavyside's supreme scorn.

"That'll teach him not to talk of young ladies in his Mabille slang,"
said Telfer, lighting his cigar. "I hope the little snob may be the
better for my lesson. Now I am _en