as another difficulty--Lucia could not be found. The right
wing was searched without result; she was nowhere. On the chance,
unlikely indeed but possible, that she had taken advantage of the new
state of things, they searched the left wing too--with an equal absence
of result. Lucia was nowhere in the house; so it was reported. The
Count was very much surprised.

"Can she have gone out at this time of night?" he cried.

The Countess was not much surprised. She well understood how Lucia
might have gone out a little way--far enough, say, to look for Captain
Dieppe, and make him aware of how matters stood. But she did not
suggest this explanation to her husband; explanations are to be avoided
when they themselves require too much explaining.

"It's very fine now," said she, looking out of the window. "Perhaps
she's just gone for a turn on the road."

"What for?" asked the Count, spreading out his hands in some
bewilderment.

The Countess, in an extremity, once more invoked the aid of the Bishop
of Mesopotamia.

"Perhaps, dear," she said gently, "to think it over--to reflect in
quiet on what she has learnt and been advised." And she added, as an
artistic touch, "To think it over under the stars, dear Andrea."

The Count, betraying a trifle of impatience, turned to the servant.

"Run down the road," he commanded, "and see if the Countess Lucia is
anywhere about." He returned to his wife's side. "One good thing
about it is that we can have our talk out," said he.

"Yes, but let 's leave the horrid past and talk about the future,"
urged the Countess, with affection--and no doubt with wisdom also.

The servant, who in obedience to the Count's order ran down the road
towards the village, did not see the Countess Lucia. That lady,
mistrusting the explicitness of her hurried note, had stolen out into
the garden, and was now standing hidden in the shadow of the barricade,
straining her eyes down the hill towards the river and the
stepping-stones. There lay the shortest way for the Captain to
return--and of course, she had reasoned, he would come the shortest
way. She did not, however, allow for the Captain's pardonable
reluctance to get wet a third time that night. He did not know the
habits of the river, and he distrusted the stepping-stones. After his
experience he was all for a bridge. Moreover he did not hurry back to
the Castle; he had much to think over, and no inviting prospect lured
him home on t