ed without a backward glance through the
swing-doors. Wilmore turned up his coat-collar and looked doubtfully up
at the rain.

"I say, old chap," he protested, "you don't really mean to walk?"

Francis thrust his hand through his friend's arm and wheeled him round
into Davies Street.

"I don't care what the mischief we do, Andrew," he confided, "but
couldn't you see what was going to happen? Oliver Hilditch was going to
introduce me as his preserver to the man who had just arrived!"

"Are you afflicted with modesty, all of a sudden?" Wilmore grumbled.

"No, remorse," was the terse reply.

CHAPTER V

Indecision had never been one of Francis Ledsam's faults, but four times
during the following day he wrote out a carefully worded telegraphic
message to Mrs. Oliver Hilditch, 10 b, Hill Street, regretting his
inability to dine that night, and each time he destroyed it. He carried
the first message around Richmond golf course with him, intending to
dispatch his caddy with it immediately on the conclusion of the round.
The fresh air, however, and the concentration required by the game,
seemed to dispel the nervous apprehensions with which he had anticipated
his visit, and over an aperitif in the club bar he tore the telegram
into small pieces and found himself even able to derive a certain
half-fearful pleasure from the thought of meeting again the woman who,
together with her terrible story, had never for one moment been out of
his thoughts. Andrew Wilmore, who had observed his action, spoke of it
as they settled down to lunch.

"So you are going to keep your engagement tonight, Francis?" he
observed.

The latter nodded.

"After all, why not?" he asked, a little defiantly. "It ought to be
interesting."

"Well, there's nothing of the sordid criminal, at any rate, about Oliver
Hilditch," Wilmore declared. "Neither, if one comes to think of it, does
his wife appear to be the prototype of suffering virtue. I wonder if you
are wise to go, Francis?"

"Why not?" the man who had asked himself that question a dozen times
already, demanded.

"Because," Wilmore replied coolly, "underneath that steely hardness
of manner for which your profession is responsible, you have a vein
of sentiment, of chivalrous sentiment, I should say, which some day or
other is bound to get you into trouble. The woman is beautiful enough
to turn any one's head. As a matter of fact, I believe that you are more
than half in love with he