“And I should have declined them, sir,” said Norwood, promptly. “The first peasant I meet with will suffice;” and, so saying, he hurried from the spot, his heart almost bursting with passion. With many a malediction of George--with curses deep and cutting on every one whose misconduct had served to place him in his present position--he took his way towards the high-road. “What could have happened?” muttered he; “what confounded fit of poltroonery has seized him? a fellow that never wanted pluck in his life! Is it possible that he can have failed now? And this to occur at the very moment they are beggared! Had they been rich, as they were a few months back, I'd have made the thing pay. Ay, by Jove! I 'd have 'coined my blood,' as the fellow says in the play, and written a swingeing check with red ink! And now I have had a bad quarrel, and nothing to come of it! And so to walk the high-roads in search of some one who can load a pistol.” A stray peasant or two, jogging along to Florence, a postilion with return horses, a shabbily dressed curate, or a friar with a sack behind him, were all that he saw for miles of distance, and he returned once more to interrogate the calessino driver as to the stranger who accompanied him from the city. Any one whose misfortune it may have been to make inquiries from an Italian vetturino of any fact, no matter how insignificant or unimportant, will sympathize with Norwood's impatience at the evasive and distrustful replies that now met his questions. Although the fact could have no possible concern or interest for him, he prevaricated and contradicted himself half-a-dozen times over, as to the stranger's age, country, and appearance, so that, utterly baffled and provoked, the Viscount turned away and entered the park. “I, too, shall be reported missing, I suppose,” said he, bitterly, as he walked along a little path that skirted a piece of ornamental water. “By Jupiter! this is a pleasant morning's work, and must have its reparation one day or other.” A hearty sneeze suddenly startled him as he spoke; he turned hastily about, but could see no one, and yet his hearing was not to be deceived! He searched the spot eagerly; he examined the little boat-shed, the copse, the underwood,--everything, in fact,--but not a trace of living being was to be seen; at last a slight rustling sound seemed to issue from a piece of rustic shell-work, representing a river god reclining on his urn, and, on approaching, he distinctly detected the glitter of a pair of eyes within the sockets of the figure. “Here goes for a brace of balls into him,” cried Norwood, adjusting a cap on his pistol. “A piece of stonework that sneezes is far too like a man to be trusted.” Scarcely was the threat uttered, when a tremulous scream issued from within, and a voice, broken with terror, called out,---- “D-don't fire, my Lord. You'll m-m-murder me. I'm Purvis--Sc-Sc-Scroope Purvis.”