nich one may say the cabman a
wrong Gare. If I say 'Ostbahnhof' when I must go from the Starnberg, I
shall surely miss the train, you know."

He looked at her gravely and she burst out laughing at the picture he
had drawn for her mind, because there is all of three or four miles
between those two particular stations.

"But I don't want you to miss the train," she said presently. "You can
play for me after you come back, I--"

At this moment the figure which had been coming towards them suddenly
resolved itself into that of a stalwart young man, who, just as he was
directly in front of them, stopped, seized Rosina in his arms and kissed
her. She very naturally screamed in fright, and her escort delivered a
blow at the stranger which sent him reeling backwards against one of the
stone pillars.

The man, who was well dressed and appeared to be a gentleman, recovered
himself with surprising quickness, and laughed oddly, saying:

"My Lord, what a welcome!"

At the sound of his voice Rosina screamed afresh, this time in quite
another tone, however, exclaiming:

"It's my cousin Jack!"

"It is your--some one you know?" stammered Von Ibn. "Then I must demand
a thousand pardons."

"Not at all," said Jack, taking his hand and shaking it heartily;
"that's all right! don't say a word more. The trouble was that when I
saw Rosina I forgot that she had gotten out of the habit of being
kissed. Of course I scared her awfully. Are you over it yet, dear?"

Rosina stood between the two men, and appeared completely stunned by her
cousin's arrival.

"Where did you drop from, anyhow?" she asked, finding her tongue at
last.

"Came over to go back with you; left Paris last night."

"Where will you stay? There isn't an empty corner in the _pension_, one
has to write ever so long ahead."

"I'm going to stay at the Vierjahreszeiten, just beside you. I'm all
right."

"Yes," said Von Ibn suddenly, "you are very right; I stay there too."

Rosina thought despairingly, "They'll see a lot of one another, and Jack
will dislike him and he'll hate Jack."

By this time they were come to her door and paused there.

"I'm going in with you," the cousin said. "Madame was so glad to see me
again that she wanted me to come back and sit next to her at supper. I
was awfully glad to see her. She's even younger and prettier than when I
last saw her--when you and I were kids there that winter, don't you
remember?"

Von Ibn was staring sombrely