"No, no," she replied, quickly, "I am your debtor. When you find out how much damage you have suffered, and what is to be done with the bear, all that can be settled. You can write to me, but I will have nothing to do with it now." With my valise over my shoulder I returned to the hall to take leave of my hostess. Now she seemed somewhat contrite. Fate and she had conquered, I was going away, and she was sorry for me. "I think it is wonderfully good of you to do all this," she said. "I wish I could do something for you." I would have been glad to suggest that she might ask me to come again, and it would also have pleased me to say that I did not believe that her husband, if he could express his opinion, would commend her apparent inhospitality to his successor. But I made no such remarks, and offered my hand, which she cordially clasped as if I were an old friend and were going away to settle in the Himalayas. I went into the yard to get Orso. He was lying down when I approached him, but I think he knew from my general appearance that I was prepared to take the road, and he rose to his feet as much as to say, "I am ready." I unfastened the chain from the post, and, with the best of wishes for good-luck from John, who now seemed to be very well satisfied with me, I walked around the side of the house, the bear following as submissively as if he had been used to my leadership all his life. I did not see the boy nor the lemon-faced woman, and I was glad of it. I believe they would have cast evil eyes upon me, and there is no knowing what that bear might have done in consequence. Mrs. Chester was standing in the door as I reached the road. "Good-bye!" she cried, "and good fortune go with you!" I raised my hat, and gave Orso a little jerk with the chain. CHAPTER IX A RUNAWAY He was a very slow walker, that bear. If I had been alone I would have been out of sight of the inn in less than five minutes. As it was, I looked back after a considerable time to see if I really were out of sight of the house, and I found I was not. She was still standing in the doorway, and when I turned she waved her handkerchief. Now that I had truly left and was gone, she seemed to be willing to let me know better than before what a charming woman she was. I took off my hat again and pressed forward. For a couple of miles, perhaps, I walked thoughtfully, and I do not believe I once thought of the bear shambling silently behind me. I had been dreaming a day-dream--not building a castle in the air, for I had seen before me a castle already built. I had simply been dreaming myself into it, into its life, into its possessions, into the possession of everything which belonged to it.