"We must find those two statues by Sara Bernhardt and Gustave Doré," said Evelyn, looking up from her Baedeker. "One of them represents----" "Oh, bother the statues!" cried Lucy. "I want to feel things to-day, not to look at them." Her voice changed suddenly. "Lady Munro," she said very softly, "that is my boy leaning on the stone balustrade. Now, did I exaggerate? Look at him!" Lady Munro walked on for a moment or two, and then glanced at the lad incidentally; but the glance extended itself with impunity into a very deliberate study. The boy's face was flushed, and he was muttering to himself incoherently as he gazed in front of him with unseeing eyes. "He looks as if he was going mad," remarked Evelyn frankly. "He looks a great deal more like an acute maniac than most acute maniacs do," said Lucy, with a proud recollection of a few visits to an asylum. "Oh, Lady Munro, do, do go and speak to him! You would do it so beautifully." Lady Munro hesitated. She never went out of her way to do good, but this boy seemed to have come into her way; and her action was none the less beautiful, because it was dictated, not by principle at all, but by sheer motherly impulse. She left the girls some distance off, and rustled softly up to where he stood. "_Pardon, monsieur,_" she said lightly, "can you tell me where the statue by Gustavo Doré is?" He started and looked up. One did not often see a gracious woman like this at Monte Carlo. "I beg your pardon," he said, making a desperate effort to collect his thoughts. Distraught as was his air, his accent and manner were cultured and refined. Lady Munro's interest in him increased. "Do you know where there is a statue by Gustave Doré?" He shook his head. "I am sorry I don't," he said, and he turned away his face. But Lady Munro did not mean the conversation to end thus. "This is a charming view, is it not?" she said. "Ye-e-s," he said; "oh, very charming." "I think I saw you at one of the tables in the Casino. I hope you were successful?" He turned towards her like a stag at bay. There was anger and resentment in his face, but far more deeply written than either of these was despair. It was such a boyish face, too, so open and honest. "Don't you see I can't talk about nothings?" it seemed to say. "You are very kind and very beautiful; I am at your mercy; but why do you torture me?" "You are in trouble," Lady Munro said, in her soft, irresistible voice. "Perhaps it is not so bad after all. Tell me about it." A woman more accustomed to missions of mercy would have calculated better the effect of her words. In another moment the tears were raining down the lad's cheeks, and his voice was choked with sobs. Fortunately, the great terrace was almost entirely deserted. Lucy and Evelyn sat at some distance, apparently deep in the study of Baedeker, and in a far-off corner an old gentleman was reading his newspaper.