sharp sea.' I tried hard to see the point of that, but
couldn't fix it."

We all laughed. Zara, I thought, was especially merry, and looked her
loveliest. She made an excellent hostess, and exerted herself to the
utmost to charm--an effort in which she easily succeeded.

The shadow on the face of her brother had not disappeared, and once or
twice I noticed that Father Paul looked at him with a certain kindly
anxiety.

The dinner approached its end. The dessert, with its luxurious dishes
of rare fruit, such as peaches, plantains, hothouse grapes, and even
strawberries, was served, and with it a delicious, sparkling,
topaz-tinted wine of Eastern origin called Krula, which was poured out
to us in Venetian glass goblets, wherein lay diamond-like lumps of ice.
The air was so exceedingly oppressive that evening that we found this
beverage most refreshing. When Zara's goblet was filled, she held it up
smiling, and said:

"I have a toast to propose."

"Hear, hear!" murmured the gentlemen, Heliobas excepted.

"To our next merry meeting!" and as she said this she kissed the rim of
the cup, and made a sign as though wafting it towards her brother.

He started as if from a reverie, seized his glass, and drained off its
contents to the last drop.

Everyone responded with heartiness to Zara's toast and then Colonel
Everard proposed the health of the fair hostess, which was drunk with
enthusiasm.

After this Zara gave the signal, and all the ladies rose to adjourn to
the drawing-room. As I passed Heliobas on my way out, he looked so
sombre and almost threatening of aspect, that I ventured to whisper:

"Remember Azul!"

"She has forgotten ME!" he muttered.

"Never--never!" I said earnestly. "Oh, Heliobas! what is wrong with
you?"

He made no answer, and there was no opportunity to say more, as I had
to follow Zara. But I felt very anxious, though I scarcely knew why,
and I lingered at the door and glanced back at him. As I did so, a low,
rumbling sound, like chariot-wheels rolling afar off, broke suddenly on
our ears.

"Thunder," remarked Mr. Challoner quietly. "I thought we should have
it. It has been unnaturally warm all day. A good storm will clear the
air."

In my brief backward look at Heliobas, I noted that when that
far-distant thunder sounded, he grew very pale. Why? He was certainly
not one to have any dread of a storm--he was absolutely destitute of
fear. I went into the drawing-room with a hesitating ste