"I happen to know the lady with whose name you were taking such unwarrantable liberties," continued the Pole, keeping his blazing eyes fixed on poor Dorris's terrified face. "She is incapable of any such conduct as you attribute to her. Once more let me warn you that you are in a country in which strange things happen; in which walls have eyes and trees ears; in which people sometimes take the law into their own hands with impunity." "Mr. Paul," cried Dorris once more, with supplicating hands, "oh, Mr. Paul!" "Awfully sorry," he replied, "but it's true. You have to jolly well mind what you say about people in this country." "Good gracious! In what country?" cried the distressed damsel. "I thought we were---- Oh, where on earth are we, Emily?" "Oh, I don't know, dear; let us go home. Never mind the review--never mind anything--only let us go home." "You are practically, though not politically, in Italy, the land of hired avengers. But I will detain you no longer, ladies. I have sufficiently warned you of the peril in which slander places people," said the Pole, politely stepping aside with the ceremonious bow seldom seen this side the Channel. Then he resumed his seat on the rock, while Dorris and her friend, frightened out of their wits, fled without any ceremony at all at the top of their speed along the white road till a bend hid them from sight. "I say, de Konski, you did give that girl beans. So you know Mrs. Allonby?" asked the young man when they were gone. "Then you must know the Johnnie they are making such a row about--the 'Storm and Stress' chap--eh?" "Yes," the Pole replied absently, his fury not yet appeased. "I know them both--at least, I used to--especially him--rather well." "Well! You did land that poor girl a nasty one. And, I say, you _can_ speak English. You must have English blood in you somehow." "Ah, yes! My--mother was English." "Well, you never seemed like a foreigner to me. That's why I took to you. Why, you must have served under our colours!" "Why not? But about this fix of yours?" "Well, what I thought when I came this morning was, that a man like you, on secret service of some kind, knowing the ropes of most things, and speaking every known lingo, might be able to get at this beast, Mosson, and square him. Fake up some rot, as you did to those poor women. Bluff." "My dear boy, there's only one way of squaring the Spider, and that is by paying him in full. Yes, I was hard on that poor fool of a girl. But a tongue like that! And think of the other, the slandered woman. By George! I could hardly keep my hands off the little liar. But the Spider. He's quite another matter. What the Spider doesn't know of the seamy side of life is not knowable. The only argument with him is hard cash down on the nail."