do we know Lecount may not think better of it? How
do we know she may not turn back before she gets to Zurich?"

That startling consideration terrified Noel Vanstone into instant
submission.

"What shall I say to the admiral?" he asked, helplessly.

"Tell him you are going to be married, to be sure! What does it matter,
now Lecount's back is turned? If he wonders you didn't tell him before,
say it's a runaway match, and the bride is waiting for you. Stop! Any
letters addressed to you in your absence will be sent to this place, of
course? Give the admiral these envelopes, and tell him to forward your
letters under cover to me. I am an old customer at the hotel we are
going to; and if we find the place full, the landlord may be depended
on to take care of any letters with my name on them. A safe address in
London for your correspondence may be of the greatest importance. How do
we know Lecount may not write to you on her way to Zurich?"

"What a head you have got!" cried Noel Vanstone, eagerly taking the
envelopes. "You think of everything."

He left the carriage in high excitement, and ran back into the house. In
ten minutes more Captain Wragge had him in safe custody, and the horses
started on their return journey.

The travelers reached London in good time that evening, and found
accommodation at the hotel.

Knowing the restless, inquisitive nature of the man he had to deal with,
Captain Wragge had anticipated some little difficulty and embarrassment
in meeting the questions which Noel Vanstone might put to him on the way
to London. To his great relief, a startling domestic discovery absorbed
his traveling companion's whole attention at the outset of the journey.
By some extraordinary oversight, Miss Bygrave had been left, on the eve
of her marriage, unprovided with a maid. Noel Vanstone declared that he
would take the whole responsibility of correcting this deficiency in the
arrangements, on his own shoulders; he would not trouble Mr. Bygrave
to give him any assistance; he would confer, when they got to their
journey's end, with the landlady of the hotel, and would examine the
candidates for the vacant office himself. All the way to London, he
returned again and again to the same subject; all the evening, at the
hotel, he was in and out of the landlady's sitting-room, until he fairly
obliged her to lock the door. In every other proceeding which related to
his marriage, he had been kept in the background; he had