The German in his turn had sprung to his feet, but Basil Jennico leant across the table, and before he could guard himself struck him lightly but deliberately across the mouth.
PART III
CHAPTER I
Memoir of Captain Basil Jennico (RESUMED IN THE SPRING OF THE YEAR 1773)
In my Castle of Tollendhal, March, 1773.
It is the will of one whose wishes are law to me that I should proceed with these pages, begun under such stress of mental trouble, until I bring the tangled story of Basil Jennico’s marriage to its singular settlement.
Without, as I now write, all over the land, the ice-bound brooks are melting, and our fields and roads are deep in impassable mud. The whole air is full of the breath of spring, as grateful to the nostrils as it is stirring to the blood of man, to the sap of trees.