She was right. Demetri Agryopoulo had come back again with twilight to
the scene of his crime, drawn by an impulse, passionate, irresistible,
supreme.

The doctor ran straight for him, leaping the hedge like a deer. Lilian,
mad with the excitement of the moment, followed she knew not how.
Demetri Agryopoulo turned and awaited the arrival of these two
onward-rushing figures calmly. The doctor laid a hand upon him.

'I arrest you on a charge of murder,' he said, gasping for breath.

'Bah!' said Demetri Agryopoulo quietly, and threw the doctor's hand
aside.

The doctor seized him again, but he was spent and breathless. The Greek
threw him off as if he had been a child.

'Are you mad?' he asked. 'What murder? Where? When?'

'My brother's murder, here, last night,' panted Lilian, and flung
herself, a mouse against a mountain, on the Greek, and grappled with
him, and actually bore him to the ground. But before the doctor could
lend a hand to aid her, Demetri was on his feet again, and with one
bound sprang into a little skiff which lay with its nose upon the bank.
He swung one of the sculls about his head, and shouted, 'Stand back!'
But the doctor watched his time, and dashed in upon him, and before he
knew it was struggling in the water, whilst Demetri in the skiff was
a score of yards away tugging madly for the farther shore. The doctor
scrambled to the bank and ran up and down the riverside looking for
another boat. But he found none, and the Greek was already growing dim
in the twilight mist. And again Demetri Agryopoulo went his own way, and
the darkness shrouded him.

CHAPTER V.

Thecla Perzio received Barndale with much shyness and embarrassment; and
he, seeing that she was a good deal afraid of him, plucked up courage
and treated her rather wilfully. He insisted on her going down to his
sister at his own house in Surrey and staying there under the old maid's
chaperonage, at least until such time as she should be able to find
another suitable companion. The more Thecla found herself overpowered by
this masterful son of Anak, the more she felt resigned, and comfortable,
and peaceful, and safe. Barndale, like the coward he was, felt his power
and took advantage of it. He would have no 'nay' on any grounds, but
exacted immediate obedience.

To make things smoother he set out that afternoon for Surrey, saw his
sister, talked her into a great state of sympathy for little Thecla,
and brought her back to