I look round. Good Heavens! what can those men find so interesting in the papers? I thought them hideously dull, when I looked over them this morning; and yet they are still persistently reading. What can they have got hold of? I cannot well see what the man beside me has; vis-à-vis is buried in an English _Times_. Just as I am thinking about him, he puts down his paper, and I see his face. Nothing very remarkable! a long black beard, and a hat tilted somewhat low over his forehead. I turn away my eyes hastily, for fear of being caught inquisitively scanning him; but still, out of their corners I see that he has taken a little bottle out of his travelling bag, has poured some of its contents into a glass, and is putting it to his lips. It appears as if--and, at the time it happens, I have no manner of doubt that he is drinking. Then I feel that he is addressing me. I look up and towards him: he is holding out the phial to me, and saying-- “May I take the liberty of offering Madame some?” “No thank you, Monsieur!” I answer, shaking my head hastily and speaking rather abruptly. There is nothing that I dislike more than being offered strange eatables or drinkables in a train, or a strange hymn book in church. He smiles politely, and then adds-- “Perhaps the _other_ lady might be persuaded to take a little.” “No thank you, sir, I’m much obliged to you,” replies Watson briskly, in almost as ungrateful a tone as mine. Again he smiles, bows, and re-buries himself in his newspaper. The thread of my thoughts is broken, I feel an odd curiosity as to the nature of the contents of that bottle. Certainly it is not sherry or spirit of any kind, for it has diffused no odour through the carriage. All this time the man beside me has said and done nothing. I wish he would move or speak, or do something. I peep covertly at him. Well! at all events, he is well defended against the night chill. What a voluminous cloak he is wrapped in; how entirely it shrouds his figure; trimmed with _fur_ too! why it might be January instead of September. I do not know why, but that cloak makes me feel rather uncomfortable. I wish they would both move to the window, instead of sitting next us. Bah! am _I_ setting up to be a timid dove? I, who rather pique myself on my bravery--on my indifference to tramps, bulls, ghosts? The clock has been deposited with the umbrellas, parasols, spare shawls, rugs, etc., in the netting above Watson’s head. The dressing-case--a very large and heavy one--is sitting on her lap. I lean forwards and say to her-- “That box must rest very heavily on your knee, and I want a footstool--I should be more comfortable if I had one--let me put my feet on it.” I have an idea that, somehow, my sapphires will be safer if I have them where I can always feel that they are _there_. We make the desired change in our arrangements. Yes! both my feet are on it.