s.

She was comfortably disposed of for the night. I drew a breath of
relief. To-morrow Great Scotland Yard should set out on the track of
the absconding Harry. Carlotta's happy recollection of his surname
facilitated the search. I lit a cigarette and opened _The Westminster
Gazette_.

A few moments later I was staring at the paper in blank horror and
dismay.

Harry was found. There was no mistake. Harry Robinson, junior partner of
the firm of Robinson & Co., of Mincing Lane. Vain, indeed, would it be
to seek the help of Great Scotland Yard. Harry had blown out his brains
in the South Western Hotel at Southampton.

I have read the newspaper paragraph over and over again to-night. There
is no possible room for doubt that it is the same Harry.

The ways of man are past interpretation. Here is an individual who
lures a girl from an oriental harem, attires her in disgusting garments,
smuggles her on board a steamer, where he claps her, so to speak, under
hatches, and has little if anything to do with her, sets her penniless
and ticketless in a London train, and then goes off and blows his brains
out. Where is the sense of it?

I have not a spark of sympathy for Harry--a callow, egotistical dealer
in currants. He ought to have blown out his brains a year ago. He has
behaved in a most unconscionable manner. How does he expect me to break
the news to Carlotta? His selfishness is appalling. There he lies,
comfortably dead in the South Western Hotel, while Carlotta has
literally not a rag to her back, her horrific belongings having been
dropped into the dust-bin. Who does he think is going to provide
Carlotta with food and shelter and a pink dress? What does he imagine is
to become of the poor waif? In all my life I have never heard of a more
cynical suicide.

I have walked about for hours, laughing and cursing and kicking the
binding loose of my precious Muratori. I have wondered whether the
universe or I were mad. For there is one thing that is clear to
me--Carlotta is here, and here Carlotta must remain.

Devastating though it be to the well-ordered quietude of my life, I must
adopt Carlotta.

There is no way out of it.

CHAPTER IV

May 25th.

Shall I be accused of harbouring a bevy of odalisques at No. 20
Lingfield Terrace? Calumny and Exaggeration walk abroad, arm in arm,
even on the north side of Regent's Park. If they had spied Carlotta at
my window this morning, they would have looked in for