“Friends!” echoed George in a dull voice. “Come, you cannot deny that you have friends; it is to some of them that you owe the good news you have just received,” said the governor. “I understand they are in the town waiting to meet you. Sir Henry--something I do not recollect, is the name of the gentleman; and the lady----” A light broke over George’s face; he spoke some broken words of thanks in a more human voice. That evening he was a free man, and was holding, dazed and trembling as with palsy, on one side the hand of Sir Henry Millard, on the other that of his daughter Ella. CHAPTER XXX. George had not known until this meeting with his old friends how much ill-health and confinement had pulled him down. He scarcely dared to look at Ella, for there came a lump in his throat whenever his eyes fell on her brave, steadfast face. Sir Henry’s presence was a great relief to them both. The baronet’s comments on the situation was so inapposite, and he had such a strong sense that he was rendered ridiculous by this journey to France to chaperon his daughter in her efforts on behalf of another woman’s husband, that he gave them something to laugh at when they were only too ready to cry. Ella was as practical as ever. “What are you going to do?” asked she, drawing George aside with her usual _brusquerie_ when the first greetings were over. “I am going to find Nouna,” said he. “She has been here, and she went away ill a fortnight ago; I have found that out, and that her black servant Sundran was with her. I must start to-night.” “You are too ill for the journey.” “I am too ill to stay here. I have some work to do in England besides.” “What work?” He did not answer, and there was a pause, during which she considered him attentively. “George,” she said at last in a low voice, “you are changed. You have lost the ‘good’ look you used to have. The work you speak of is something unworthy of you.” “It must be something very degrading then; you forget I am a----” She stopped him imperatively. “You are my ideal of an Englishman, as honest as any and not so stupid as some. If you hadn’t been unlucky, I should never have told you so, but now that you know what a surpassingly lofty opinion I have of you, I expect you to live up to it.” “You must let me be human though.” “That depends. There is good and bad humanity. What do you want to do?” “I want to--well--I want to--get at that scoundrel Rahas!” “You may--on one condition.” “Well?” “You musn’t lay a hand on him until you have seen Nouna.” George looked at her wonderingly. “Tell me why you make that condition.” Her answer came at once in a full, deep, steady voice, that betrayed even more than her words did.