'But how?'
Then the Beguine told her how she had become aware of it; and that she too was an Alison, Lison or Lisette—it was all one—and as she spoke her hearer's memory went back to that day with the buckhounds on which our story opens, when Bevil Goring expressed some surprise at her name, and she had explained that it was an old Scoto-French one, and common to the Cheynes of Essilmont; and as she thought of him she pressed his ring to her lips, as if it had been some sacred relique.
'How well you speak English,' said Alison.
'Because I was educated in the English convent at Bruges,' replied the sister; 'but hark, there is a voiture at the gate—monsieur has come!'
'Papa,' murmured Alison, in a choking voice, as she felt herself become a very child again, and another minute saw his arms around her, and her face upon his breast, while she indulged in a passionate fit of weeping, and he with difficulty restrained his tears.
Alison then, after a little time, looked earnestly in his face, and was shocked to see how wan, and thin, and pinched it had become; for indeed, during the mystery that enveloped her disappearance, he had undergone terrible mental agony and much bodily fatigue, for with all his selfishness he loved Alison as the only link that bound him to earth.
Her narrative of how she missed Lord Cadbury in that crowded place, the Théâtre des Variétés, to which she should never have gone, tallied completely with that of the former; but it was not until next day that she detailed fully the manner in which she had been lured by 'Captain Smith' to the Café au Progrès, and the terror with which she had fled from that place into the snowy street.
'Captain Smith!' exclaimed Sir Ranald through his set teeth, while his eyes sparkled with rage. 'Could I but meet that person, old as I am, I would give him cause long to remember the weight of my cane, the scoundrel. I must write to Cadbury on the subject and inquire.'
'Write!—is Lord Cadbury gone?' asked Alison, timidly and hopefully.
'Yes, back to London; he was telegraphed for.'