part from his body, that's an unknown
quantity we scientific men don't deal in.'

She looked at them both with a look of indescribable compassion, and
went away. Skelton would fain have followed the woman out into the sunny
street, but he remained to pay that courtesy which was due to the
brusque good nature of his companion.

After examining the room and finding nothing more of interest, he went
and talked over the physical circumstances of the case with the parish
doctor. He did not gain much information about the patient's diseased
body, and naturally none whatever concerning the whereabouts of his
soul. The peculiar interest of the case he did not mention to any one.
Afterwards he went back to the neighbourhood by himself, and
endeavoured, as quietly as possible, to find out what traces the man's
past life had left upon the minds of his neighbours. Ten years bring
more change to any community than we are apt to suppose; and among the
poor, where rude necessity rules rather than choice, there is more
change than among the rich. There were a few who had seen McGair moving
up and down the streets, and knew him to have been a book-binder by
trade. One or two remembered the widow Wilkes and her daughter, and
could affirm that they had been friends of McGair and had moved away
after his illness. Whither they had gone no one knew.

When there was nothing more to be seen or heard at Yarm, Skelton went
home. Again he threw himself into all the daily interests of his life in
order that he might think the more dispassionately of the circumstances
of this strange case. In truth it was not now entirely out of curiosity
that he was tempted to think of it; his sympathy had been stirred by the
courage and sorrow of the woman whom he had so idly accosted on that
bright autumn day only a few weeks before. She had appealed to him
because he had knowledge. Was all his knowledge, then, powerless to help
her? He believed that the shadowy appearance which dogged her footsteps
could only be some projection of mind, whether or not its cause was the
strong will of the paralytic transcending the ordinary limits of time
and space, he could not tell. Certainly no discussion as to its nature
and origin could in any way aid its victim, and he could only fall back
upon the comfort material kindness and sympathy could give. At last he
went down once more to West Chilton, this time for the express purpose
of seeing Jen.

He found the cottage in