"Odd! Something of the same sort happened to me. It was at Mentone I first encountered the de Fontanes. On two or three evenings I played _écarté_. I lost; but not five hundred pounds. Two or three days afterwards the sum which I had lost came to me enclosed in an envelope. Not a scrap of writing was with it, but the address was in a feminine hand; I always suspected it came from the lady. When I again inquired for the de Fontanes they were gone. But my curiosity was piqued. I did not forget them. So I renewed the acquaintance when I saw them here." "If he challenges me, what shall I do? I promised not to fight him. Besides, the thing would be a rank absurdity." "Stand to your promise. I tell you what to do. There's a boat leaves for Folkestone in an hour. Let's go by it together." "But wouldn't that look like running away?" "It would be running away." Mr Davison did not quite like this way of putting it, but he went. They travelled together. On the boat Mr Davison remembered the locket. He opened it. It contained a portrait of the giver. As he eyed it, he observed in that curious vernacular which is an attribute of some examples of modern youth,-- "By Jingo! aren't those French girls goers?" But Mr Lintorn was an older man. His range was wider. "Don't judge of a nation by an individual. Mdlle. de Fontanes is unique; the product, I should say, of a very singular experience." Actually, Mr Davison kissed the portrait. "I will always keep it," he said. X THE GIRL AND THE BOY CHAPTER I Archie Ferguson's smoking-room. He and I its only occupants. We had been to a meeting of the Primrose League which had been held at the neighbouring county town. Knocking off the ash from his cigar, he broke an interval of silence by asking me a question. "Did you notice a woman who, just as we were leaving the hall, came up and shook hands with me in rather an effusive way?" "A good-looking, well-dressed woman, with rather an effusive smile? I wondered who she was." "She's a Mrs Bennett-Lamb. The weight-carrying man who was standing at her side was Mr Bennett-Lamb. Perhaps you know the name. She and her husband have been the owners of a good deal of the public-house property in London which is worth owning. They're the proud possessors of some of it still. They've made a heap of money. Some of it they've spent in buying a place near here--Oakdene. It's on the cards that their daughter--they've only one, and she's an uncommonly pretty girl--will make a first-rate match. In which case, no doubt, they'll try to graduate for county honours." He flicked off another scrap of ash before he spoke again. "It was Mrs Bennett-Lamb who found the money with which to start the firm. The way in which she found it was curious. It's a queer story. I'll tell it you, if you like. It's a rather good one." I lit another cigar; and smoked it while Ferguson told his story.