6

two minutes more the Cygnet' was ploughing her way stoutly through the sea, with her stern towards the Digue and her nose towards the invisible coast of Dorsetshire.

Still, Hugh couldn't take his eyes off pretty little Mlle. Eulalie. She was standing all the time near the paddle-box, watching the white foam from the wheels, and perhaps crying a little, Hugh imagined, about the good people she had left behind at Gruchy-les-Gréville. (Not that Hugh then knew of the very existence of Gruchy-but that is anticipating.)

Well, after twenty minutes or so, the young lady began to get tired, and turned around to look for a seat. Alas for the improvidence of early youth! they were all already taken. Mlle. Eulalie walked up and down the centre row twice, and looked inquiringly towards the men who filled them; but nobody stirred. Good, solid, stout, middle-aged Englishmen, could she have imagined you were really going to give up your own places for a pretty French girl's accommodation? Mlle. Eulalie began to sigh pensively. She had taken no berth; must she then stand by the paddle-box an entire evening? Hugh Portledown saw her uneasy little glance, and, even at the risk of offending her, rose from his carefully secured seat and motioned her into it. Mademoiselle is looking for a place,' he said hastily; 'mademoiselle will permit me?'

6

Eulalie smiled, and of course blushed again. (What a divine little trick of blushing she had got, to be sure!) Monsieur is very good,' she answered, but he will require the place himself. Do not derange yourself, I beg of you;' for she was half afraid that this monsieur with the handsome moustache was really making a deliberate attempt to get her into a conversation, and was not that the very thing her good grandpapa had specially warned her against ?

'Not at all,' Hugh replied, motioning her into the comfortable corner, so that (were it but to avoid unseemly higgling over it) she was obliged to accept his offer. It will not be for long, mademoiselle. You will soon be going down to claim your berth, no doubt, and then I can resume the position.'

'But I have no berth,' Eulalie put in quickly-fate thus compelling her to continue the dangerous dialogue. 'I mean to pass the night on deck; the night is so cool, so tranquil; and I can't turn monsieur out of the place he has secured for himself for the whole evening.'

'Pray don't trouble about it,' Hugh answered, with a smile. 'I can find another by-and-by, when some of these bears here go downstairs for the night.' And then, being too much of a gentleman to force his society further upon her, he walked off

again and took up Eulalie's previous place beside the paddlebox.

6

'Poor thing,' he thought to himself, she can't afford to take a berth even! I'm awfully sorry for her. Pretty, too, decidedly pretty; and what a sweet, musical voice! Going to be a gover

ness h'm. What stupid fools they must be over in Normandy. Why didn't some fellow or other go and marry her, I should like to know, instead of sending her about her business, wee trembling little thing that she is, to teach French to a pack of jealous English schoolgirls? Had no dot, I suppose: beastly mercenary fellows, these young bourgeois Frenchmen. Not got a quarter of an ounce of sentiment among the whole lot of them.'

By-and-by the other passengers began to drop off one by one, until at last Hugh and Eulalie were left alone on deck to their own devices. Nobody else was going to sit it out, apparently. This was decidedly awkward. The night was so calm, the moon so full and poetical, the two young people so exceedingly interesting: Upon my word,' thought Hugh, the situation is really becoming quite romantic.' However, as mademoiselle would have none of him, he didn't care to try any further conversation; so he rolled his light rug carefully around him, and took up his temporary abode at the very farthest opposite end of the cushioned seat.

6

Eulalie seemed to think the rug a good idea, for she took up her own bundle shortly after and began to slowly unstrap it. But the bundle had been strapped very tight indeed by that good grandpapa, kneeling on it and pulling with all his might and main, and, let her tug at it as best she might, she couldn't undo the tongue of the buckle. Hugh watched her efforts philosophically for at least two minutes (Greenwich time), until he could stand it no longer.

'Mademoiselle must really excuse me again,' he said, rising; 'but I think I can undo that rug for her.'

Mademoiselle laughed nervously, and handed the bundle to the terrible dragon. The terrible dragon took it lightly, and with a single pull undid the buckle.

'It was drawn very tight,' he said, as he unrolled the shawls. 'Ah, yes,' answered Eulalie simply, half crying at the thought. 'It was done with all his force by that dear grandpapa.'

Hugh ventured to place one shawl around her shoulders, and to lay another one quietly across her knees. Mademoiselle did not resist his attention: she was beginning to reflect that perhaps even in England some young people may be perfectly convenable. 'Thank you,' she said, quite seriously, 'you are very kind. I'm afraid I'm giving you a lot of trouble.'

'Not at all, Mademoiselle Leruth,' Hugh answered, once more raising his hat, and quite unconsciously using the name he had seen upon the label on the bundle. He had thought of her by that name all along, and he said it out now without even ever thinking of it.

'How, monsieur!' Eulalie cried, starting with surprise. You know my name, then? You have seen me? You have been at Gruchy ?'

No, mademoiselle, I have not been at Gruchy, though I have just passed through the Côtentin on foot, and admired much your beautiful paysage. But I knew your name quite accidentally, having seen it on your baggage.'

Eulalie sighed. "Ah!' she said, 'I thought you knew Gruchy -that lovely village. But you have seen the Côtentin, and you admire it. Ah, yes; it is beautiful! I left Gruchy only this morning.'

'And you are going to England to be a governess?' Hugh said, interrogatively.

'But, monsieur, you are a magician! You know everything. Yes; I go to be a governess; but how on earth did you ever find it out?'

'Oh, mademoiselle, nothing could be easier. Your label was addressed to Miss Spurter's, Weston.'

'You know Mees Spoortare, then? She is of your country?' 'No; I don't know her, but I saw she kept a ladies' school. So many young French ladies come to England to be governesses; and I'm afraid they don't always like our nation.'

And so the conversation got fairly rolling, before Eulalie herself was half aware of it. Presently, Hugh brought a vacant stool over near mademoiselle, and, seating himself on it, settled down for a long talk. Mademoiselle noticed this action with alarm, and blushed again violently (but blushes don't show by moonlight). Clearly she had forgotten all that that dear grandpapa had said to her on that important subject. However, it was too late to draw back now; and besides, the monsieur was so agreeable. Eleven o'clock is a very confidential hour; I can't say why, but experience has demonstrated the fact that if you are talking to the merest stranger after eleven has struck you somehow grow very confidential. Mademoiselle Eulalie did, at any rate. She began telling Hugh a little about herself, and her grandpapa, and Gruchy ; and Hugh, being really interested (for a pretty girl, it may be commonly observed, is really a very interesting subject of conversation), drew her on to tell him her simple history, of which, to say the truth, there was hardly any. She was an orphan-that was all

-and she had lived with her grandparents during the time she was being educated; and now she was going to England to be a governess. And yet Mademoiselle Eulalie took about an hour to tell this simple story, pieced out with various information about that dear grandpapa, and that dear grandmamma, and the lovely country all around Gruchy.

Hugh noticed that all the time while Mademoiselle Eulalie was talking to him she clasped her little purse tightly in one hand, as the grandpapa had especially enjoined upon her. Mind you don't put it into your pocket,' he had told her, for in England there are a great many pickpockets, against whom you must be on your guard.' And though Eulalie hadn't followed his advice about not conversing with the monsieurs, she had made up for it by holding as hard as she could to her precious purse.

By-and-by, mademoiselle began to shiver. The night, in fact, was getting cold, and even through her rugs she felt it chilly. 'Let us get up and walk a little,' Hugh suggested politely. "That will warm mademoiselle most assuredly.' Mademoiselle, now completely demoralised, accepted the suggestion, and paced the deck briskly by Hugh's side. They walked up and down till they were fairly tired, and then Eulalie, who had got back to Gruchy and the curé, stood for a while by the gunwale, looking over once more into the water, whitened by the paddle-wheels and gleaming beautifully in the clear moonlight.

She leant for a minute or two by the gunwale, with her hands both hanging over listlessly; when, all of a sudden, there was a slight lurch, a cry, a splash, a glimpse of some small object falling into the water; and Eulalie wrung her hands piteously, exclaiming, like a tragedy queen, I have lost my purse!'

Hugh was really distressed at this untoward accident. 'Oh, I'm so sorry,' he cried quickly. Was there much in it?'

6

'Twenty francs,' Mademoiselle Eulalie sobbed out bitterly, again wringing her pretty little ungloved hands; and it was all the money I had with me.'

'If mademoiselle will permit me-'Hugh began, and suddenly broke off. He was going to add, 'I shall be proud to let her consider my purse as her own until she reaches her destination.' On the spur of the moment he had thought of lending her a sovereign, and managing so to arrange that she couldn't return it to him; but there, even as he spoke, he bethought himself of that wretched sixpence, and checked himself immediately with a disagreeable effort. 'Have you paid for your ticket as far as Weston?' he asked,

"Yes, monsieur.

'Well, that's well at any rate,' Hugh said; otherwise,' he could add this more safely now, I should have been delighted to lend you whatever you required.' Which was perfectly true, as far as it went, though Hugh did add to himself the mental reservation, if I had it with me.'

6

'You are very kind, monsieur,' the poor girl replied, and then relapsed into complete silence. It was perfectly clear that the loss of that poor little twenty francs had rendered her for the moment wholly inconsolable. Hugh pitied the poor girl from the bottom of his heart. Indeed, as he luckily knew her address at Weston, he made up his mind that the moment he returned to Bristol he would send her twenty francs anonymously, care of Miss Spurter, and concoct some cock-and-bull story about its having been found in a purse clinging to a hawser, or something else equally harmless and impossible.

After that, the conversation flagged decidedly. It was getting towards the small hours of the morning; and Eulalie, between grief and sleepiness, dozed off at last with her rugs wrapped warmly around her, and didn't fully wake up again till nearly six the next morning. Candour compels me to confess that Hugh Portledown very shortly followed her example. When they woke up again, they were nearing the low white cliffs outside Poole Harbour, lighted up by a magnificent sunrise. However, I have frequently observed that sunrise is far from being so romantic a season as sunset. There is a cold rawness about it which renders it naturally unfit for the promotion of romance, or even of polite conversation. People are mostly monosyllabic at sunrise, and their noses assume a very unpoetical cerulean hue. So it must be admitted that Hugh and Eulalie didn't talk much to one another until they were fairly ashore at Poole landing-place.

There, Hugh found his services as interpreter actively called into requisition at last for Mademoiselle Eulalie's benefit. He arranged matters amicably with the custom-house officers (though mademoiselle was inclined to be a little indignant when the officer inquired whether she had any tobacco or spirits in her little portmanteau), and he saw her safe up to the railway station. Then, for the last time as he thought, he raised his hat, and said to her a little regretfully, Bon jour, mademoiselle. Au revoir. I shall not have the pleasure of seeing you any farther for the present, I fear; for I go to Bristol hence by the third class.'

Mademoiselle Eulalie blushed several shades deeper than she had ever hitherto done, and answered demurely, 'I also have a ticket for the troisième. Do I go to Westonne by the same train as you do to Bristol, monsieur?'