"There you err," said John. "You will start with me in half an hour for Paris." CHAPTER XIII. "There's not a crime But takes its proper change out still in crime If once rung on the counter of this world." E. B. BROWNING. There is in Paris, just out of the Rue du Bac, a certain old-fashioned hotel, the name of which I forget, with a little _cour_ in the middle of the rambling old building, and a thin fountain perennially plashing therein, adorned by a few pigeons and feathers on the brink. It had been a very fashionable hotel in the days when Madame Mohl held her _salon_ near at hand. But the old order changes. It was superseded now. Why John often went there I don't know. He probably did not know himself, unless it was for the sake of quiet. Anyhow, he and Archie arrived there together that morning; for it is needless to say that, having determined to get Archie at any cost out of London, John had carried his point, as he had done on previous occasions, to the disgust of the sulky young man, who had proved anything but a pleasant travelling companion, and who, late in the afternoon, was still invisible behind the white curtains in one of the two little bedrooms that opened out of the sitting-room in which John was walking up and down. He had put several questions to Archie respecting the state of his father's health, and that gentleman had assured him he was all right, quite able to look after himself; no need for him to remain with him. "Of course not," said John, "or you would not have left him. But is he able to attend to business?" "Rather," said Archie, with the emphasis of ignorance. As long as Archie was in the next room, out of harm's way, John did not want his company. He knew that when he did appear he had to tell him that for eight and twenty years he had lived on Colonel Tempest's substance; and then he must post the letter lying ready written on the table to Colonel Tempest, only needing the address.