Moonchild

Dijon. Concealing himself as best he could, the doctor walked rapidly to the head of the train. There, assuming the character of a timid old man, he [126] implored the driver, with the gift of the bewitched "cart-wheel," to be sure to drive carefully. He would drink the good fellow's health, to be sure — what name? Oh! Marcel Dufour. "Of the furnace — that is appropriate!" laughed the genial passenger, apparently reassured as to his security. But he did not enter the train. He dashed out of the station, and into a motor-cab, overjoyed to return to Douglas with so clean a record of work accomplished. He never gave the Turk another thought. But Akbar Pasha had had an idea. Balloch had taken a ticket for Dijon — he would take one, too. And he would go — he would retrieve his error of yesterday. He was not in the least afraid of that cub Grey, when Simon Iff was not there to back him. It would go hard, but he should get a drop of Lisa's blood — if he had to bribe the wagon-lit man. Then — who knows? — there might even be a chance to kill Grey. He waited till the last moment before he boarded the train. The train would stop at Moret-les-Sablons; by that time the beds would be made up; he would have plenty of time to act; he could go on to Rome if necessary. Cyril Grey, away from the influence of Simon Iff, had become the sarcastic sphinx once more. He was wearing a travelling suit with knickerbockers, but he still affected the ultra-pontifical diplomatist. "The upholstery of these cars is revolting," he said to Lisa, with a glance of disgust. And he suddenly opened the door away from the platform and lifted her on to the permanent way; thence into a stuffy compartment in the train that was standing at the next "Voie." "A frosty moonlight night like this," he said, pulling a large black pipe from his pocket and filling [127] it, "indicates (to romantic lovers like ourselves) the propriety of a descent at Moret, a walk to Barbizon through the forest, a return to Moret by a similar route in a day or so, and the pursuance of our journey to Naples. See Naples and die!" he added musingly, "decidedly a superior programme." Lisa would have listened to a proposition to begin their travels by swimming the Seine, on the ground that the day after to-morrow would be Friday; so she raised no objection. But she could not help saying that they