ed the Doctor's thought:

'Suicide! But I must convey the inutility of such effort by inference,
not falsity.'

Accordingly he began to describe the scene, from the very base of the
wall, where below the balcony the great border was glorious with a mass
of foliage plants, away to the distant sea, now bathed in the flood of
moonlight. Harold asked question after question; the Doctor replying
accurately till he felt that the patient was building up a concrete idea
of his surroundings near and far. Then he left him. He stood for a long
time out in the passage thinking. He said to himself as he moved away:

'The poor fellow has some grim intention in his mind. I must not let him
know that I suspect; but to-night I will watch without his knowing it!'

CHAPTER XXXIV--WAITING

Mr. Hilton telegraphed at once countermanding, for the present, the nurse
for whom he had sent.

That night, when the household had all retired, he came quietly to his
patient's room, and entering noiselessly, sat silent in a far corner.
There was no artificial right; the patient had to be kept in darkness.
There was, however, a bright moonlight; sufficient light stole in through
the edges of the blinds to allow him, when his eyes grew accustomed, to
see what might happen.

Harold lay quite still till the house was quiet. He had been thinking,
ever since he had ascertained the identity of Stephen. In his weakness
and the paralysing despair of his blindness all his former grief and
apprehension had come bank upon him in a great wave; veritably the tide
of circumstances seemed to run hard against him. He had had no idea of
forcing himself upon Stephen; and yet here he was a guest in her house,
without her knowledge or his own. She had saved his life by her energy
and resource. Fortunately she did not as yet know him; the bandages, and
his act in suppressing his voice, had so far protected him. But such
could not last for long. He could not see to protect himself, and take
precautions as need arose. And he knew well that Stephen's nature would
not allow her to be satisfied without doing all that was possible to help
one who had under her eyes made a great effort on behalf of others, and
to whom there was the added bond that his life was due to her. In but a
little time she must find out to whom she ministered.

What then would happen? Her kindness was such that when she realised the
blindness of her old friend she might so pi