John Trevanion looked at him intently with a startled curiosity and earnestness. “I can’t suppose,” he said, “when it comes to that, much as we have paid for concealment, that you have not heard something--” “Miss Trevanion told me,” said Rivers--he paused a moment, feeling that it was a cruel wrong to him that he should be compelled to say Miss Trevanion--he who ought to have been called to her side at once, who should have been in a position to claim her before the world as his Rosalind--“Miss Trevanion gave me to understand that the lady whom I had met in Spain, whose portrait was on her table, was--” “My sister-in-law--the mother of the children--yes, yes--and what then?” John Trevanion cried. “Only this, Trevanion--that lady is here.” John caught him by the arm so fiercely, so suddenly, that the leisurely waiters standing about, and the few hotel guests who were moving out and in in the quiet of the morning stopped and stared with ideas of rushing to the rescue. “What do you mean?” he said. “Here? How do you know? It is impossible.” “Come out into the garden, where we can talk. It may be impossible, but it is true. I also saw her last night.” “You must be mad or dreaming, Rivers. You too--a man in your senses--and-- God in heaven!” he said, with a sudden bitter sense of his own unappreciated friendship--unappreciated even, it would seem, beyond the grave--“that she should have come, whatever she had to say, to you--to any one--and not to me!” “Trevanion, you are mistaken. This is no apparition. There was no choice, of me or any one. That poor lady, whether sinned against or sinning I have no knowledge, is here. Do you understand me? She is here.” They were standing by this time in the shadow of the great laurel bushes where she had sheltered on the previous night. John Trevanion said nothing for a moment. He cast himself down on one of the seats to recover his breath. It was just where Hamerton had been sitting. Rivers almost expected to see the faint stir in the bushes, the evidence of some one listening, to whom the words spoken might, as she said, be death or life. “This is extraordinary news,” said Trevanion at last. “You will pardon me if I was quite overwhelmed by it. Rivers, you can’t think how important it is. Where can I find her? You need not fear to betray her--oh, Heaven, to betray her to me, her brother! But you need not fear. She knows that there is no one who has more--more regard, more respect, or more-- Let me know where to find her, my good fellow, for Heaven’s sake!”