that he had not time even to think of leaving a
message for his friend.

In these circumstances, he resolved to clear his character by paying a
visit on the following Sunday to Number 6 Grovelly Street, Shadwell
Square.

CHAPTER TWELVE.

BEGINS WITH LOVE, HOPE, AND JOY, AND ENDS PECULIARLY.

It may not perhaps surprise the reader to learn that after Lilly
Blythe's return to town, I did not prosecute my studies with as much
enthusiasm as before. In fact I divided my attentions pretty equally
between Lilly and chemistry.

Now, I am not prone to become sentimentally talkative about my own
affairs, but as courtship, and love, and that sort of thing are
undoubted and important elements in the chemistry of human affairs, and
as they influenced me and those around me to some extent, I cannot avoid
making reference to them, but I promise the reader to do so only as far
as appears necessary for the elucidation of my story.

First, then, although I knew that my prospects of success as a partner
of Dr McTougall were most encouraging, I felt that it would be foolish
to think of marriage until my position was well established and my
income adequate. I therefore strove with all my might to check the flow
of my thoughts towards Miss Blythe. As well might I have striven to
restrain the flow of Niagara. True love cannot be stemmed! In my case,
however, the proverb was utterly falsified, for my true love _did_ "run
smooth." More than that, it ran fast--very fast indeed, so much so that
I was carried, as it were, on the summit of a rushing flood-tide into
the placid harbour of Engagement. The anchorage in that harbour is with
many people uncertain. With Lilly and me it was not so. The
ground-tackle was good; it had caught hold of a rock and held on.

It happened thus. After many weeks of struggling on my part to keep out
of Miss Blythe's way, and to prevent the state of my feelings from being
observed by her--struggles which I afterwards found to my confusion had
been quite obvious to her--I found myself standing alone, one Sunday
afternoon, in the doctor's drawing-room, meditating on the joys of
childhood, as exemplified by thunderous blows on the floor above and
piercing shouts of laughter. The children had been to church and were
working off the steam accumulated there. Suddenly there was a dead
silence, which I knew to be the result of a meal. The meal was, I may
add, the union of a late dinner with an early