xample,
that years ago the name of Bradfield used to strike with a causeless
familiarity upon my ear; and since then, as you know, the course of my
life has flowed through it. And so when I first saw Winnie La Force in
the railway carriage, before I had spoken to her or knew her name, I
felt an inexplicable sympathy for and interest in her. Have you had
no experience of the sort in your life? Or was it merely that she was
obviously gentle and retiring, and so made a silent claim upon all that
was helpful and manly in me? At any rate, I was conscious of it; and
again and again every time that I met her. How good is that saying of
some Russian writer that he who loves one woman knows more of the whole
sex than he who has had passing relations with a thousand! I thought I
knew something of women. I suppose every medical student does. But now I
can see that I really knew nothing. My knowledge was all external. I did
not know the woman soul, that crowning gift of Providence to man, which,
if we do not ourselves degrade it, will set an edge to all that is good
in us. I did not know how the love of a woman will tinge a man's whole
life and every action with unselfishness. I did not know how easy it is
to be noble when some one else takes it for granted that one will be
so; or how wide and interesting life becomes when viewed by four eyes
instead of two. I had much to learn, you see; but I think I have learned
it.

It was natural that the death of poor Fred La Force should make me
intimate with the family. It was really that cold hand which I grasped
that morning as I sat by his bed which drew me towards my happiness. I
visited them frequently, and we often went little excursions together.
Then my dear mother came down to stay with me for a spell, and turned
Miss Williams gray by looking for dust in all sorts of improbable
corners; or advancing with a terrible silence, a broom in one hand and
a shovel in the other, to the attack of a spider's web which she had
marked down in the beer cellar. Her presence enabled me to return some
of the hospitality which I had received from the La Forces, and brought
us still nearer together.

I had never yet reminded them of our previous meeting. One evening,
however, the talk turned upon clairvoyance, and Mrs. La Force was
expressing the utmost disbelief in it. I borrowed her ring, and holding
it to my forehead, I pretended to be peering into her past.

"I see you in a railway carriage," s