end and enter the establishment. As she went
in, he took one look at the back of her bonnet. It had a little green
feather in it. Then he turned quickly upon Cheditafa, who had shut the
carriage door and was going around behind it in order to get up on the
other side.

"Look here," whispered Banker, seizing the clerical butler by the
shoulder, "who is that lady? Quick, or I'll put a knife in you."

At these words Cheditafa's heart almost stopped beating, and as he
quickly turned he saw that he looked into the face of a man, an awfully
wicked man, who had once helped to grind the soul out of him, in that
dreadful cave by the sea. The poor negro was so frightened that he
scarcely knew whether he was in Paris or Peru.

"Who is she?" whispered again the dreadful Rackbird.

"Come, come!" shouted the coachman from his seat, "we must move on."

"Quick! Who is she?" hissed Banker.

"She?" replied the quaking negro. "She is the captain's wife. She is--"
But he could say no more, for a policeman was ordering the carriage to
move on, for it stopped the way, and the coachman was calling
impatiently. Banker could not afford to meet a policeman. He released his
hold on Cheditafa and retired unnoticed. An instant afterward he entered
the Bon Marche.

Cheditafa climbed up to the side of the driver, but he missed his
foothold several times, and came near falling to the ground. In all Paris
there was no footman on a carriage who looked less upright, less sedate,
and less respectable than this poor, frightened black man.

Through the corridors and passageways of the vast establishment went
Banker. But he did not have to go far. He saw at a counter a little green
feather in the back of a bonnet. Quietly he approached that counter, and
no sooner had the attendant turned aside to get something that had been
asked for than Banker stepped close to the side of the lady, and leaning
forward, said in a very low but polite voice:

"I am so glad to find the captain's wife. I have been looking for her."

He was almost certain, from her appearance, that she was an American, and
so he spoke in English.

Edna turned with a start. She saw beside her a man with his hat off, a
rough-looking man, but a polite one, and a man who looked like a sailor.

"The captain!" she stammered. "Have you--do you bring me anything!
A letter?"

"Yes, madam," said he. "I have a letter and a message for you."

"Give them to me quickly!" said she, her face bur