When Walters came back to tell me that his wife was uncertain as to the

exact date when the captain would return, I began to rave about that

courtyard. At once he was my friend. I had been looking for quiet

lodgings away from the hotel, and I was delighted to find that on the

second floor, directly under the captain's rooms, there was a suite to

be sublet.

Walters gave me the address of the agents; and, after submitting to an

examination that could not have been more severe if I had asked for the

hand of the senior partner's daughter, they let me come here to live.

The garden was mine!

And the captain? Three days after I arrived I heard above me, for the

first time, the tread of his military boots. Now again my courage began

to fail. I should have preferred to leave Archie's letter lying in

my desk and know my neighbor only by his tread above me. I felt that

perhaps I had been presumptuous in coming to live in the same house with

him. But I had represented myself to Walters as an acquaintance of the

captain's and the caretaker had lost no time in telling me that "my

friend" was safely home.

So one night, a week ago, I got up my nerve and went to the captain's

rooms. I knocked. He called to me to enter and I stood in his study,

facing him. He was a tall handsome man, fair-haired, mustached--the

very figure that you, my lady, in your boarding-school days, would have

wished him to be. His manner, I am bound to admit, was not cordial.

"Captain," I began, "I am very sorry to intrude--" It wasn't the thing

to say, of course, but I was fussed. "However, I happen to be a neighbor

of yours, and I have here a letter of introduction from your cousin,

Archibald Enwright. I met him in Interlaken and we became very good

friends."

"Indeed!" said the captain.

He held out his hand for the letter, as though it were evidence at

a court-martial. I passed it over, wishing I hadn't come. He read it

through. It was a long letter, considering its nature. While I waited,

standing by his desk--he hadn't asked me to sit down--I looked about

the room. It was much like my own study, only I think a little dustier.

Being on the third floor it was farther from the garden, consequently

Walters reached there seldom.

The captain turned back and began to read the letter again. This was

decidedly embarrassing. Glancing down, I happened to see on his desk

an odd knife, which I fancy he had brought from India. The blade was

of steel, dangerously sharp, the hilt of gold, carved to represent some

heathen figure.




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