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98
MOTIOX PICTURE MAGAZINE
THE VENDETTA
her. Then, in plain hearing of Barnes, the conversation went on about her catching the express for Nice that noon to join her brother.
"Give my love to Mr. Anstruther, ' ' said the other.
"Anstruther !" Where had Barnes heard that name before. Then the scrawl on the pistol-barrel flashed before him, and, putting two and two together, he also resolved to take the express to Nice.
It might be thought that Barnes was very impressionable, perhaps soft, but remember that he had been waiting many years, with more or less inconsistency, for just such a looking girl as the one by his side, and now he knew that he must follow her.
Mr. Barnes contrived it, by liberally tipping the guard, that his seat should be in the same compartment with the beautiful young English traveler. She did not appear to notice him at all and lost herself in the pages of a novel.
It is a ten-hour run to Lyons, and Barnes calculated that his vis-avis had not eaten her dinner before starting. Even beautiful English girls traveling alone must eat, and Barnes decided that the indifferent one in his compartment must be starved into submission.
By various contrivances the ingenious guard managed to keep her from getting to the refreshment booths at Tonnerre and Dijon. At Macon the tray of delicacies being carried to her slipped from the hands of a careless
boy and was shattered on the platform.
Each time that the fair victim glanced toward Barnes he strove, as nearly as possible, to give himself the attitude of the Barnes she had ad-, mired in the picture. This had nothing but a fearful effect on the girl — she was led to believe her seatmate had been drinking.
With the final catastrophe of the dishes at Macon, Barnes sprang his grand strategy. The guard opened the door and brought in a basket-meal that Barnes had wired ahead for. It comprised everything that money could buy, and Barnes set it out on the seat, under the nostrils of the starved girl.
And the next instant, to his polite offer, she had cast modesty aside and was reveling in the land of plenty.
In the midst of a soulful portion of pate de foie gras, her fork paused in midair.
"Please pardon my curiosity," she asked, "but do 3Tou always wire ahead for two sets of knives and forks ? ' '
Barnes actually blushed. No words were ready.
1 ' Try some of this Chablis, ' ' he suggested, with a hangdog look.
If Barnes had not been urging the great affair of his heart, he would have noticed the sharp-eyed man who
THE VENDETTA RENEWED