f he waits.
Encourage him to take the best assistance he can get from strangers,
and to set about manning the yacht without any further delay. The more
occupation he has to keep him away from this house, and the less you
encourage him to stay here if he does come, the better I shall be
pleased. Don't forget that, and don't forget one last direction which I
have now to give you. When the vessel is ready for sea, and when Allan
invites us to sail with him, it is my wish that you should positively
decline to go. He will try to make you change your mind; for I shall, of
course, decline, on my side, to leave you in this strange house, and in
this foreign country, by yourself. No matter what he says, let nothing
persuade you to alter your decision. Refuse, positively and finally!
Refuse, I insist on it, to set your foot on the new yacht!'

"He ended quietly and firmly, with no faltering in his voice, and no
signs of hesitation or relenting in his face. The sense of surprise
which I might otherwise have felt at the strange words he had addressed
to me was lost in the sense of relief that they brought to my mind. The
dread of _those other words_ that I had expected to hear from him left
me as suddenly as it had come. I could look at him, I could speak to him
once more.

"'You may depend,' I answered, 'on my doing exactly what you order me
to do. Must I obey you blindly? Or may I know your reason for the
extraordinary directions you have just given to me?'

"His, face darkened, and he sat down on the other side of my
dressing-table, with a heavy, hopeless sigh.

"'You may know the reason,' he said, 'if you wish it.' He waited a
little, and considered. 'You have a right to know the reason,' he
resumed, 'for you yourself are concerned in it.' He waited a little
again, and again went on. 'I can only explain the strange request I have
just made to you in one way,' he said. 'I must ask you to recall what
happened in the next room, before Allan left us to-night.'

"He looked at me with a strange mixture of expressions in his face. At
one moment I thought he felt pity for me. At another, it seemed more
like horror of me. I began to feel frightened again; I waited for his
next words in silence.

"'I know that I have been working too hard lately,' he went on, 'and
that my nerves are sadly shaken. It is possible, in the state I am in
now, that I may have unconsciously misinterpreted, or distorted, the
circumstances that really took