er hand upon the bell-pull, and sounded a peal at
the bell which was so rapidly answered that I more than half suspected,
and, indeed, do now more than half suspect, that the man who responded
to it had been listening.

"Show Captain Fyffe out," said her ladyship. And so, a definite
end being put to the interview, I left the house as wrathful and as
humiliated a man as any to be found that hour in London. So long as I
live I shall not forget the smug alacrity with which the servant obeyed
the behest of his mistress. I was in a state to wreak my own ill-humor
upon anybody, and it was in my mind, and more than half in my heart, to
kick that smug man in livery down the steps. I have suffered all my life
from a certain Scotch vivacity of temperament which it has cost me
many and many a hard struggle to control. It has not often been more
unreasonable or more vigorous in its internal demonstrations than it
was then, but I managed to reach the street and to walk away without
exposing myself. As to where I went for the next few hours I never had
the remotest idea. I must have walked a good many miles, for at last,
when I pulled up, I found myself, at five o'clock in the evening, in
a part of the town to which I was a complete stranger, and I had
a confused remembrance of Oxford Street and the parks, and then of
Highgate Archway. I made out, after a while, that I was at the East End,
and, turning westward, I tramped back to my own lodgings with a return
to self-possession which was partly due to the fact that bodily fatigue
had dulled the sting of resentment.

Hinge had dinner ready when I reached home, but I had no appetite for
it, and, to the good fellow's dismay, I sent it away untasted. I turned
over a thousand schemes that evening, and rejected each in turn. But I
decided, finally, to prepare an advertisement for the newspapers, Which
might perhaps prevent further mischief. I concocted so many subterfuges,
each of which in turn proved to reveal too much or to be too
enigmatical, that at ten o'clock I found myself with a dozen sheets of
closely-written paper before me. But at last I hit on this:

"Dear Violet,--Distrust altogether anything you may hear to
my disadvantage until I have found an opportunity to
explain. Do not wonder at not hearing from me. Both your
letters and mine are intercepted. When you next write, post
letter with your own hand."

After much consideration, I hit upon "John of