leepy eye and effectually drove the sleep
from it was this head-line:

ROMANCE OF THE CALCUTTA SWEEPSTAKES

And beneath it another in type almost as large as the first:

POOR CLERK WINS L40,000

His own name leaped at him from the printed page, and with it that of
the faithful Gelatine.

Flight! That was the master-word which rang in Roland's brain as day
followed day. The wild desire of the trapped animal to be anywhere
except just where he was had come upon him. He was past the stage when
conscience could have kept him to his obligations. He had ceased to
think of anything or any one but himself. All he asked of Fate was to
remove him from Bury St. Edwards on any terms.

It may be that some inkling of his state of mind was wafted
telepathically to Frank and Percy, for it can not be denied that their
behavior at this juncture was more than a little reminiscent of the
police force. Perhaps it was simply their natural anxiety to keep an eye
on what they already considered their own private gold-mine that made
them so adhesive. Certainly there was no hour of the day when one or the
other was not in Roland's immediate neighborhood. Their vigilance
even extended to the night hours, and once, when Roland, having tossed
sleeplessly on his bed, got up at two in the morning, with the wild idea
of stealing out of the house and walking to London, a door opened as he
reached the top of the stairs, and a voice asked him what he thought he
was doing. The statement that he was walking in his sleep was accepted,
but coldly.

It was shortly after this that, having by dint of extraordinary strategy
eluded the brothers and reached the railway-station, Roland, with his
ticket to London in his pocket and the express already entering the
station, was engaged in conversation by old Mr. Coppin, who appeared
from nowhere to denounce the high cost of living in a speech that lasted
until the tail-lights of the train had vanished and Brothers Frank and
Percy arrived, panting.

A man has only a certain capacity for battling with Fate. After this
last episode Roland gave in. Not even the exquisite agony of hearing
himself described in church as a bachelor of this parish, with the grim
addition that this was for the second time of asking, could stir him to
a fresh dash for liberty.

Altho the shadow of the future occupied Roland's mind almost to the
exclusion of everything else, he was still capable of suffering a
certain amount of