ight, after all, have been transmitted from
Hupeh and Hankow of which he had never hitherto suspected the existence.

It cannot be said that his self-questioning had produced any answer more
definite than that before he found himself journeying back toward
Boston. The final impulse had been given him while he was still
loitering aimlessly in Chicago by a letter from Mrs. Temple.

"If you have nothing better to do, dear Peter," she wrote, "we shall be
delighted if you can come to us for a week or two. Dear Drusilla is with
us once again, and you can imagine our joy at having her. It would seem
like old times if you were here to complete the little circle. The room
you used to have in your college vacations--after dear Tom and Sarah
were taken from us--is all ready for you; and Drusilla would like to
know you were here to occupy it just as much as we."

In accepting this invitation Davenant knew himself to be drawn by a
variety of strands of motive, no one of which had much force in itself,
but which when woven together lent one another strength. Now that he had
come, he was glad to have done it, since in the combination of
circumstances he felt there must be an acknowledged need of a young man,
a strong man, a man capable of shouldering responsibilities. He would
have been astonished to think that that could be gainsaid.

The feeling was confirmed in him after he had watched the tip of his
smoked-out cigarette drop, like a tiny star, into the current of the
Charles, and had re-entered Rodney Temple's house.

"Here's Peter!"

It was Drusilla's voice, with a sob in it. She was sitting on the
stairs, three steps from the top, huddled into a voluminous
mauve-and-white dressing-gown. In the one dim light burning in the hall
her big black eyes gleamed tragically, as those of certain animals gleam
in dusk.

"Oh, Peter, dear, I'm so glad you've come! The most awful thing has
happened."

That was Mrs. Temple who, wrapped in something fleecy in texture and
pink in hue, was crouched on the lowest step, looking more than ever
like a tea-cozy dropped by accident.

"What's the matter?" Davenant asked, too deeply astonished even to take
off his hat. "Is it burglars? Where's the professor?"

"He's gone to bed. It isn't burglars. I wish it was. It's something far,
far worse. Collins told Drusilla. Oh, I know it's true--though Rodney
wouldn't say so. I simply ... _know_ ... it's ... _true_."

"Oh, it's true," Drusilla corrobo