“‘Good-bye!’ I heard the woman’s muffled voice say, and the echo came at once:
“‘Good-bye, my love--my heart and soul to you--always!’
“The sun was lighting up the whole place with extraordinary brilliancy, and I distinctly saw a tear splash on his gloved hand that rested on the edge of the balcony, as she fairly ran for the opposite staircase. He--poor devil--remained for a few minutes where he was, his shoulders rising and falling queerly, and he nervously pulled down his fur collar as if he wanted air. The face I saw then, for a glancing second, was that of young Moray. And I wondered; because that _Lesghise_ assuredly spoke no English, barely a few lately acquired phrases of French, perhaps--if that! Next day a grave political complication drove the whole thing out of my head, and I have never thought of it since.”
“The winter of four years ago!” Basil soliloquized, and, recollecting himself, he added with a laugh: “You have a good memory, General. Fancy recalling--even with a little extraneous aid--so trifling an incident after four long years!”
The General, who was not quite proof against compliment, got up and rubbed his hands.
“Eh! Eh!” he cried. “It does not always follow that gray hairs must needs dull the brain beneath them. I could still have been of considerable use, I believe, to our Imperial Master; but, as I happen to know, he was strongly advised to the contrary, and so here I am now, lazing my life away, inactive and growing fat, with my ear split like a reformed French cavalry horse. But must you really go? Of course, now that you have wrung me dry, you leave me without a scruple, for such are the ways of the world. But you were always a cajoler, my dear Basil, and knew how to gain your ends. I hope that some day in the near future you will honor me with more details concerning this affair of the English captain, for I cannot understand how you can be so interested in him as to waste an hour over it.”
“Waste, General? An hour spent with you is never wasted.”
“There you are again! Flattery, vile flattery! And you are going straight on from here to your beautiful Tverna? Pray place my homage at Madame Palitzin’s pretty feet. How is she, by the way? Upon my word, I am losing my manners.”