[Illustration: THE GIRL'S OWN PAPER VOL. XX.--NO. 979.] OCTOBER 1, 1898. [PRICE ONE PENNY.] "OUR HERO." A TALE OF THE FRANCO-ENGLISH WAR NINETY YEARS AGO. BY AGNES GIBERNE, Author of "Sun, Moon and Stars," "The Girl at the Dower House," etc. [Illustration: "A FAIR, CURLY HEAD POPPED UP."] _All rights reserved._] CHAPTER I. IF WAR SHOULD BREAK OUT. "You don't mean to say it, my dear sir! You're absolutely jesting. I'm compelled to believe that you are pleased to talk nonsense. To take the boy! Impossible!" "I never was more sober in my life, I do assure you, ma'am." "The thing is incredible. No, sir, I cannot believe it. 'Tis bad enough that you should be going abroad at all at this time, you and your wife. But to place an innocent babe of eleven years in the power of that wicked Corsican----Close upon thirteen, say you? Well, well, twelve years old! 'tis much the same. My dear sir, war is a certainty. We shall be embroiled with France before six weeks are ended." "That is as may be. We intend to be at home again long before six weeks are gone by. A fortnight in Paris; nothing more. The opportunity is not to be lost; and as you know, all the world is going to France just now. So pray be easy in your mind." Colonel Baron adjusted his rigid stock, and held his square chin aloft, looking over it with a benevolent though combative air towards the lady opposite. Mrs. Bryce was a family friend of long standing, and she might say what she chose; but nothing was farther from his intentions than to alter his plans, merely because Mrs. Bryce or Mrs. Anybody-Else chose to volunteer unasked advice. There was a spice of obstinacy in the gallant Colonel's composition. Despite civilian dress--swallow-tailed coat, brass buttons, long flapped waistcoat, white frilled shirt-front, and velvet knee-breeches, with silk stockings, the Colonel was a thorough soldier in appearance. He had not yet left middle age behind, and he was still spare in figure, and upright as a dart. Mrs. Bryce, a lively woman, in age perhaps between thirty and thirty-six, had bright twinkling eyes. She was dressed much _a la mode_, in the then fashionable figured muslin, made long and clinging, her white stockings and velvet shoes showing through it in front. The bonnet was of bright blue; and a silk spencer, of the same colour, was cut low, a large handkerchief covering her shoulders. A short veil descended below her eyes. She used her hands a good deal, flirting them about expressively as she talked.