passage across the river.
Thus he also would reach the village, pass through it, and mount the
hill to the Cross. His way was shorter and his pace quicker. To be
there before the lady would be only polite; it would also give him a
few minutes in which to arrange his thoughts and settle what might be
the best way to open to her the new--the very new--things that he had
to say. In the preoccupation of these he thought little of his later
appointment at seven o'clock--although it was in view of this that he
had slipped the revolver into his pocket.

Finally, just about the same time also, Guillaume was rehearsing to
Paul de Roustache exactly what they were to do and where their
respective parts began and terminated. Paul was listening with deep
attention, with a curious smile on his face, and with the inner
reflection that things in the end might turn out quite differently from
what his astute companion supposed would be the case. Moreover--also
just in case of accidents--both of these gentlemen, it may be
mentioned, had slipped revolvers into their pockets. Such things may
be useful when one carries large sums of money to a rendezvous, equally
so in case one hopes to carry them back from it. The former was M.
Guillaume's condition, the latter that of Paul de Roustache. On the
whole there seemed a possibility of interesting incidents occurring by
or in the neighbourhood of the Cross on the hillside above the village.

What recked the Count of Fieramondi of that? He was busy composing his
lyric in honour of the return of his forgiven and forgiving Countess.
Of what was happening he had no thought.

And not less ignorant of these possible incidents was a lady who this
same evening stood in the courtyard of the only inn of the little town
of Sasellano, where the railway ended, and whence the traveller to the
Count of Fieramondi's Castle must take a carriage and post-horses.

The lady demanded horses, protested, raged; most urgent business called
her to pursue her journey, she said. But the landlord hesitated and
shook his head.

"It 's good twelve miles and against collar almost all the way," he
urged.

"I will pay what you like," she cried.

"But see, the rain falls--it has fallen for two hours. The water will
be down from the hills, and the stream will be in flood before you
reach the ford. Your Excellency had best sleep here to-night. Indeed
your Excellency must."

"I won't," said her Excellency flat