"They are asking if you have any luggage, and if they may carry it to your hotel, Sir Simon," spoke a free, pleasant voice, evidently on the burst of laughter. And Sir Simon turned to behold George Paradyne, and seized his hand in gladness at being relieved from his dilemma. To hear the boy interpreting between Sir Simon and the women; to note that his French tongue was ready and fluent as theirs and with rather a more refined sound in it, was somewhat mortifying to Bertie Loftus. The women disappeared, George talking fast and laughing after them. "What brings you here? When did you come?" asked Sir Simon, keeping him by his side. "We came yesterday, Sir Simon. I am with the Galls. They kindly invited me to accompany them. We are at the Hotel du Nord." "The Galls here, and at the Norde!" almost shouted Sir Simon in his delight. "I shall have somebody that I can speak English with." Yes; the Galls had made friends with George Paradyne and brought him to Boulogne with them. Mrs. Gall, a woman of the kindest and truest nature, had told her husband, told her son, that she should make the school ashamed of its prejudice against Paradyne. William Gall had not accompanied them: he was coming later. Sir Simon had known nothing of their movements: he had been a week and more from home. The Talbots were coming; the Browns were coming; Leek and his mother, Lady Sophia, were already there. As Sir Simon remarked, it seemed like an arranged party. Such, however, was not the case. "What a lingo, to be sure!" cried Sir Simon, as he trotted up the hot and blazing port. "Why, actually those little street urchins are jabbering French! Halloa! stop!" he added, coming to a sudden halt opposite the goods' custom-house: "Where's Dick!" Nobody remembered to have seen Dick since the landing. "He'll turn up, sir," returned Loftus, slightly annoyed at the unequal progress they were making. "Dick won't get lost." Sir Simon did not feel so sure upon the point; he thought he might get lost himself in that helpless foreign town; becoming, as he was, more strange and bewildered every moment. But Dick came running up from behind, dragging with him a tall, square-built man with a thoughtful face and grey hair. Sir Simon nearly shook his hands off, for it was Mr. Gall. "What a mercy!" said he. "I never was so glad in all my life; did not know anything of your coming. We have been a week at Chatham, staying near my poor brother Joe, the hop-dealer, who made that sad failure of it. You know him, Gall. I wanted to see how he and the wife and chicks were of, poor things, and we put up at an inn there." Dick shook hands with Paradyne. Dick listened to the news that Onions was in the town, and that Talbot was arriving, with a sort of rapture: the Browns too, major and minor. Dick would have stood on his head had there been room on the port to do it.