e jagged hole.

"Here is the picture, doctor," he said, as a dripping, gasping head came
up for the second time. "I must ask a thousand pardons for this--shall I
say, liberty? But, as you know, I'm off my head. Good night. Let me
recommend a hot drink when you come out. There are only five feet of
water, so you won't drown." And with that he skated rapidly away.

Escott had a glimpse of him vanishing round the corner of the island, and
then the ice broke again, and down he went. Four, five, six times he made
a desperate effort to get out, and every time the thin ice tore under his
hands, and he slipped back again. By the seventh attempt he had broken his
way to the thicker sheet; he got one leg up, slipped, got it up again, and
at last, half numbed and wholly breathless, he was crawling circumspectly
away. When at last he ventured to rise to his feet, he skated with all the
speed he could make to the seat where he had left his coat. A pair of
skates lay there instead, but the coat had vanished. Dr Escott's
philosophical estimate of Mr Beveridge became considerably modified.

"Thank the Lord, he can't get out of the grounds," he said to himself;
"what a dangerous devil he is! But he'll be sorry for this performance, or
I'm mistaken."

When he arrived at the house his first inquiries were for his tutor in the
art of vine-cutting, and he was rather surprised to hear that he had not
yet returned, for he only imagined himself the victim of a peculiarly
ill-timed practical joke.

Men with lanterns were sent out to search the park; and still there was no
sign of Mr Beveridge. Inquiries were made at the lodge, but the gatekeeper
could swear that only a single carriage had passed through. Dr Congleton
refused at first to believe that he could possibly have got out.

"Our arrangements are perfect,--the thing's absurd," he said, peremptorily.

"That there man, sir," replied Moggridge, who had been summoned, "is the
slipperiest customer as ever I seed. 'E's hout, sir, I believe."

"We might at least try the stations," suggested Escott, who had by this
time changed, and indulged in the hot drink recommended.

The doctor began to be a little shaken.

"Well, well," said he, "I'll send a man to each of the three stations
within walking distance; and whether he's out or in, we'll have him by
to-morrow morning. I've always taken care that he had no money in his
pockets."

But what is a doctor's care against a woman's heart? Fo