The lawyer avoided her distressed eyes.

"Well," he said slowly, "the law is rather summary. I--your
excellency understands I only do my duty. I am not the principal.
I have no authority whatever--except the law."

"You mean that I must go at once?"

The lawyer's parchment face was generously expressive of grief now.

"Excellency, the lease terminated at the death of the late Caballero
Challoner."

Eve stood for a moment, breathing hard. Fate seemed suddenly to
have turned against her at every point. At this moment Captain
Bontnor made bold--one could see him doing it--to take her hand.

"My dear," he said, "I don't quite understand what this foreign
gentleman and you are talkin' about. But if it's trouble, dear, if
it's trouble--just let me try."



CHAPTER VII. IN THE STREET OF THE PEACE.

Measure thy life by loss instead of gain,
Not by the wine drunk, but the wine poured forth.

"MY DEAR MISS CHALLONER,--I learn that you are in Barcelona, and at
the same time I find with some indignation that my lawyer in