rd to keep
his mind upon his work. It would slip away to brood upon the man beneath
him, and upon the little mystery which hung round his chambers. Then his
thoughts turned to this singular attack of which Hastie had spoken, and
to the grudge which Bellingham was said to owe the object of it. The two
ideas would persist in rising together in his mind, as though there were
some close and intimate connection between them. And yet the suspicion
was so dim and vague that it could not be put down in words.

"Confound the chap!" cried Smith, as he shied his book on pathology
across the room. "He has spoiled my night's reading, and that's reason
enough, if there were no other, why I should steer clear of him in the
future."

For ten days the medical student confined himself so closely to his
studies that he neither saw nor heard anything of either of the men
beneath him. At the hours when Bellingham had been accustomed to visit
him, he took care to sport his oak, and though he more than once heard a
knocking at his outer door, he resolutely refused to answer it. One
afternoon, however, he was descending the stairs when, just as he was
passing it, Bellingham's door flew open, and young Monkhouse Lee came
out with his eyes sparkling and a dark flush of anger upon his olive
cheeks. Close at his heels followed Bellingham, his fat, unhealthy face
all quivering with malignant passion.

"You fool!" he hissed. "You'll be sorry."

"Very likely," cried the other. "Mind what I say. It's off! I won't hear
of it!"

"You've promised, anyhow."

"Oh, I'll keep that! I won't speak. But I'd rather little Eva was in her
grave. Once for all, it's off. She'll do what I say. We don't want to
see you again."

So much Smith could not avoid hearing, but he hurried on, for he had no
wish to be involved in their dispute. There had been a serious breach
between them, that was clear enough, and Lee was going to cause the
engagement with his sister to be broken off. Smith thought of Hastie's
comparison of the toad and the dove, and was glad to think that the
matter was at an end. Bellingham's face when he was in a passion was not
pleasant to look upon. He was not a man to whom an innocent girl could
be trusted for life. As he walked, Smith wondered languidly what could
have caused the quarrel, and what the promise might be which Bellingham
had been so anxious that Monkhouse Lee should keep.

It was the day of the sculling match between Hastie and