liberty which had hitherto been his. It seemed that he had been
picked up on the road helpless and insensible by some one with the
will and power to take entire charge of him. The feeling was so new
to this adventurer that he lay still and smiled.

Presently the nun rose and came quietly towards him, disclosing
within the halo of her snowy cap a gentle pink-and-white face
wrinkled by the passage of uneventful years. She nodded cheerfully
on seeing that his eyes were open, and gave him some soup which was
warming on a spirit lamp in readiness for his return to
consciousness.

"I will tell the Senorita," she said, and noiselessly quitted the
room.

A minute later Miss Cheyne came in with a pleasant frou-frou of
silk, and Whittaker wondered for whom she had dressed so carefully.

"I did not know," she said in English, with an ease of manner which
is of this generation, "that I had succoured a countryman. You were
literally thrown at my gate. But the doctor, who has just left,
confirms the opinion of Brother Lucas that you are not seriously
hurt. A broken fore-arm and a severe shake, they say--to be cured
by complete rest, which you will be able to enjoy here. For there
is no one in the house but my aunt, Mrs. Dorchester, and myself."

She stood at the bedside, looking down at him with her capable,
managing air. Whittaker now knew the source of that sense of being
"taken in and done for," of which he had become conscious the moment
his senses returned to him.