As I turned from the door, I could scarcely avoid laughing aloud at the figure before me. He stood opposite a large mirror, his hat on one side of his head, one arm in his breast, and the other extended, leaning upon his stick; a look of as much ferocity as such features could accomplish had been assumed, and his whole attitude was a kind of caricature of a melo-dramatic hero in a German drama. "Why, O'Leary, what is all this?" "Hush, hush," said he, in a terrified whisper--"never mention that name again, till we are over the frontier." "But, man, explain--what do you mean?" "Can't you guess," said he drily. "Impossible; unless the affair at the saloon has induced you to take this disguise, I cannot conceive the reason." "Nothing farther from it, my dear friend; much worse than that." "Out with it, then, at once." "She's come--she's here--in this very house--No. 29, above the entre sol." "Who is here, in No. 29, above the entre sol?" "Who, but Mrs. O'Leary herself. I was near saying bad luck to her." "And does she know you are here?" "That is what I can't exactly say," said he, "but she has had the Livre des Voyageurs brought up to her room, and has been making rather unpleasant inquiries for the proprietor of certain hieroglyphics beginning with O, which have given me great alarm--the more, as all the waiters have been sent for in turn, and subjected to long examination by her. So I have lost no time, but, under the auspices of your friend Trevanion, have become the fascinating figure you find me, and am now Compte O'Lieuki, a Pole of noble family, banished by the Russian government, with a father in Siberia, and all that; and I hope, by the end of the week, to be able to cheat at ecarte, and deceive the very police itself." The idea of O'Leary's assuming such a metamorphosis was too absurd not to throw me into a hearty fit of laughing, in which the worthy emigre indulged also. "But why not leave this at once," said I, "if you are so much in dread of a recognition?" "You forget the trial," added O'Leary, "I must be here on the 18th or all my bail is forfeited." "True--I had forgot that. Well, now, your plans?"-- "Simply to keep very quiet here till the affair of the tribunal is over, and then quit France at once. Meanwhile, Trevanion thinks that we may, by a bold stratagem, send Mrs. O'Leary off on a wrong scent, and has requested Mrs. Bingham to contrive to make her acquaintance, and ask her to tea in her room, when she will see me, en Polonais, at a distance, you know--hear something of my melancholy destiny from Trevanion--and leave the hotel quite sure she has no claim on me. Meanwhile, some others of the party are to mention incidentally having met Mr. O'Leary somewhere, or heard of his decease, or any pleasant little incident that may occur to them." "The plan is excellent," said I, "for in all probability she may never come in your way again, if sent off on a good errand this time."