f.

Her life was in his hands.

He could rush forward swiftly and close the gate, then, raising an
alarm, get away before he was seen; or--he could escape now.

What had he to do with her? A weird, painful suggestion crept into his
brain: he was not responsible for her, and he was responsible for
a woman up there by the hospital, whose home was the valley of the
Chaudiere!

If Kathleen were gone, what barrier would there be between him and
Rosalie? What had he to do with this strange disposition of events?
Kathleen was never absent from her church twice on Sundays; she was
devoted to work of all sorts for the church on week-days--where was
her intervening personal Providence? If Providence permitted her to
die?--well, she had had two years of happiness with the man she loved,
at some expense to himself--was it not fair that Rosalie should have
her share? Had he the right to call upon Rosalie for constant
self-sacrifice, when, by shutting his eyes now, by being dead to
Kathleen and her need, as he was dead to the world he once knew, the way
would be clear to marry Rosalie?

Dead--he was dead to the world and to Kathleen! Should his ghost
interpose between her and the death now within two-score feet of her?
Who could know? It was grim, it was awful, but was it not a wild kind
of justice? Who could blame? It was the old Charley Steele, the Charley
Steele of the court-room, who argued back humanity and the inherent
rightness of things.

But it was only a moment's pause. The thoughts flashed by like the
lightning impressions of a dream, and a voice said in his ear, the voice
of the new Charley with a conscience:

"Save her--save her!"

Even as he was conscious of another presence on the lawn, he rushed
forward noiselessly. Stealing between Kathleen and the gate-she was
within five feet of it he closed and locked it. Then, with a quick
glance at her sleeping face-it was engraven on his memory ever
after like a dead face in a coffin--he ran along the fence among the
shrubbery. A man not fifty feet away called to him.

"Hush--she is asleep!" Charley whispered, and disappeared.

It was Fairing himself who saw this deed which saved Kathleen's life.
Awaking, and not finding her, he had glanced towards the window, and
had seen her on the lawn. He had rushed down to her, in time to see her
saved by a strange bearded man in habitant dress. His one glance at the
man's face, as it turned towards him, produced an extraordin