k a falsehood, and
from that hour his thoughts never rested upon the widow Tresize as a
desirable woman to wed.

But he had grave searchings of conscience on the part he had been
made to play. Undoubtedly he had misled Mr Rattenbury, and--all
question of public honesty apart--had perhaps injured that young
officer's chances of promotion.

The thought of it disturbed his sleep for weeks. In the end he
decided to make a clean breast to Mr Rattenbury, as between man and
man; and encountering him one afternoon on the Lealand road, drew up
old Dapple and made sign that he wished to speak.

It's about Mrs Tresize--' he began.

'You've heard, then?' said Mr Rattenbury.

'Heard what?'

'Why, that I'm going to marry her.'

'Oh!' said the doctor; and added after a pause, 'My dear sir, I wish
you joy.'

'I don't feel that I deserve her,' said Mr Rattenbury, somewhat
fatuously.

'Oh!' said the doctor again. 'As for that--'

He did not conclude the sentence, but drove on in meditation.

It is to be supposed that with marriage the widow mended her ways.
Certainly she can have dabbled no more in smuggling, and as certainly
she had told the truth about her age. Thrice in the years that
followed Doctor Unonius spent some hours of the night, waiting, in
the best kitchen at Landeweddy; and Mrs Rattenbury on neither of
these occasions--so critical for herself--forgot to have him provided
with a decanter of excellent brandy.

The doctor sipping at it and gazing over the rim of the glass at Mr
Rattenbury--nervous and distraught, as a good husband should be--on
each occasion wondered how much he knew.

MUTUAL EXCHANGE, LIMITED.

CHAPTER I.

Millionaire though he was, Mr Markham (_nee_ Markheim) never let a
small opportunity slip. To be sure the enforced idleness of Atlantic
crossing bored him and kept him restless; it affected him with
_malaise_ to think that for these five days, while the solitude of
ocean swallowed him, men on either shore, with cables at their
command, were using them to get rich on their own account--it might
even be at his expense. The first day out from New York he had spent
in his cabin, immersed in correspondence. Having dealt with this and
exhausted it, on the second, third, and fourth days he found nothing
to do. He never played cards; he eschewed all acquaintance with his
fellow men except in the way of business; he had no vanity, and to be
stared at on the promenade deck b