king away the basin and towel he had used in washing her wound.

'Out of the window, gracious lady,' he said, as he disappeared into the
next room.

'Out of the window!' cried Ortensia in astonishment. 'Is he dead?'

'No, alive and well,' answered Trombin from the distance. 'But I hear
something at this very moment,' he added, coming back empty-handed and
trying the front window, as if he did not know that it was fastened with
nails.

He laid his ear to the crack, and held out one hand to keep Ortensia
silent.

'Yes,' he whispered an instant later, loud enough for her to hear.
'Yes--it is the sound of kicking and running--some one is kicking some
one else down the hill--it is gone now!'

He stood upright again and looked round at Ortensia, whose face betrayed
her anxiety, now that she was fully conscious.

'Who can it be?' she asked.

'Most gentle lady,' answered Trombin, 'I do not know, but I suspect,
pray, hope, and inwardly believe that the patient, if I may so call him,
was Don Alberto, and the kicker was very likely my friend Gambardella.'

'But you were to have brought my husband here! Your friend told me so!'

Ortensia's memory came back completely at Gambardella's name, and she
slipped her feet from the sofa to the floor and sat up suddenly. Trombin
was, of course, prepared for the question with a plausible story, but he
could never count on his presence of mind when he was in love and alone
for the first time with the object of his affections.

'Madam,' he answered, 'the truth is--or, as I may say, the facts in the
case are----' he stammered and stopped, for the lovely Venetian had
risen and was beside him already, her frightened eyes very near his, and
her hand on his sleeve. His heart beat like a scared bird's and his head
was whirling.

'Where is my husband?' cried Ortensia in wild anxiety. 'Something has
happened to him, and you are afraid to tell me! For heaven's sake----'

It had never been in Trombin's nature to be rough with a woman. In the
two or three cases in which he had been concerned in 'removing' a lady,
obnoxious to her husband or relations, he had been accused by his
companion of being soft-hearted; but while Ortensia was speaking he was
in such a state of rapt adoration that he quite forgot to listen to what
she said; and instead of answering when she waited for his reply, he
took the hand that lay on his sleeve in his, with such a gentle and
sympathetic touch that she did not r