where, I don't know."

"You are in Geneva Square," said Denzil, trying to sharpen the dulled
wits of the man.

"I wish I was in No. 13 of it," sighed the stranger. "Where the deuce is
No. 13? Not in this Cloudcuckooland, anyhow."

"Oh!" cried Lucian, taking the man's arm. "Come with me. I'll lead you
home, Mr. Berwin."

Scarcely had the name passed his lips than the stranger drew back
suddenly, with a hasty exclamation. Some suspicion seemed to engender a
mixture of terror and defiance which placed him on his guard against
undue intimacy, even when some undefined fear was knocking at his heart.
"Who are you?" he demanded in a steadier tone. "How do you know my
name?"

"My name is Denzil, Mr. Berwin, and I live in one of the houses of this
square. As you mention No. 13, I know you can be none other than Mr.
Mark Berwin, the tenant of the Silent House."

"The dweller in the haunted house," sneered Berwin, evidently relieved,
"who stays there with ghosts, and worse than ghosts."

"Worse than ghosts?"

"The phantoms of my own sins, young man. I have sowed folly, and now I
am reaping the crop. I am----" Here his further speech was interrupted
by a fit of coughing, which shook his lean figure severely. At its
conclusion he was so exhausted that he was forced to support himself
against the railings. "A portion of the crop," he murmured.

Lucian was sorry for the man, who seemed scarcely capable of looking
after himself, and he thought it unwise to leave him in such a plight.
At the same time, he was impatient of lingering in the heart of the
clammy fog at such a late hour; so, as his companion seemed indisposed
to move, he caught him again by the arm without ceremony. The abrupt
action seemed to waken again the fears of Berwin.

"Where would you take me?" he asked, resisting the gentle force used by
Lucian.

"To your own house. You will be ill if you stay here."

"You are not one of them?" asked the man suddenly.

"One of whom?"

"One of those who wish to harm me?"

Denzil began to think he had to do with a madman, and to gain his ends
he spoke to him in a soothing manner, as he would to a child: "I wish to
do you good, Mr. Berwin," said he gently. "Come to your home."

"Home! home! Ah, God, I have no home!"

Nevertheless, he gathered himself together, and with his arm in that of
his guide, stumbled along in the thick, chill mist. Lucian knew the
position of No. 13 well, as it almost faced the lodgings oc