face to face with the wreck of all his hopes. "Do you know that
this is an insult to my daughter and to me?"

"My lord," returned Kimberley, "I am very sorry, but it was a shame to
ask her to marry a man like me. I won't help to break her heart--I
can't--not if I break my own a million times over."

The earl beat his foot upon the carpet. It was true enough. It _had_
been a shame; and yet the man was a gentleman when all was said and
done.

"By heaven, Kimberley," cried his lordship, in spite of himself, "you
are a noble-hearted fellow!"

"Excuse me the trouble I have caused you. Good-bye, my lord." Kimberley
bowed and left.

That night Kimberley received a package containing the papers and a note
from the earl congratulating him on the magnanimous manner in which he
had acted, but declaring that he felt compelled to return the documents.
This added another drop to the bitterness of Kimberley's cup. He could
well nigh have died for shame; he could well nigh have died for pity of
himself.

_V.--Kimberley's Wedding Gift_

"My lord," said Kimberley, as he met the earl of Windgall outside the
London hotel where the earl was staying, "can you give me a very few
minutes?"

"Certainly," said his lordship. "You are not well?" he added, with
solicitude.

He had brought a dispatch-box with him; he put it on the table and
slowly unlocked it. The earl's heart beat violently as he looked once
more upon the precious documents.

"You sent these back to me," said Kimberley. "Will you take 'em now? My
lord, my lord, marry lady Ella to the man she loves, and take these for
a wedding gift. I helped to torture her. I have a right to help to make
her happy."

Windgall was as wildly agitated as Kimberley himself. He recoiled and
waved his hands.

"I--I do not think, Kimberley," he said with quivering lip, "that I have
ever known so noble an act before."

"If I die," said Kimberley in a loud voice which quavered suddenly down
into a murmur, "everything is to go to Lady Ella, with my dearest love
and worship."

Windgall caught only the first three words; he tugged at the bell-pull,
and sent for a doctor.

An hour afterwards Kimberley was in bed with brain fever.

On the following morning Jack Clare stood in the rain on the deck of the
steamship Patagonia, a travelling-cap pulled moodily over his eyes,
watching the bestowal of his belongings in the hold.

"Honourable Captain Clare aboard?" cried a voice from the qua