. The tenor of his life removed him from
those situations. Such chivalry as he displayed was of a negative order.
And confronted suddenly with the conduct of Hughs, who, it seemed,
knocked his wife about, and dogged the footsteps of a helpless girl, he
took it seriously to heart.

When the little model came walking up the garden on her usual visit, he
fancied her face looked scared. Quieting the growling of Miranda, who
from the first had stubbornly refused to know this girl, he sat down with
a book to wait for her to go away. After sitting an hour or more,
turning over pages, and knowing little of their sense, he saw a man peer
over his garden gate. He was there for half a minute, then lounged
across the road, and stood hidden by some railings.

'So?' thought Hilary. 'Shall I go out and warn the fellow to clear off,
or shall I wait to see what happens when she goes away?'

He determined on the latter course. Presently she came out, walking with
her peculiar gait, youthful and pretty, but too matter-of-fact, and yet,
as it were, too purposeless to be a lady's. She looked back at Hilary's
window, and turned uphill.

Hilary took his hat and stick and waited. In half a minute Hughs came
out from under cover of the railings and followed. Then Hilary, too, set
forth.

There is left in every man something of the primeval love of stalking.
The delicate Hilary, in cooler blood, would have revolted at the notion
of dogging people's footsteps. He now experienced the holy pleasures of
the chase. Certain that Hughs was really following the girl, he had but
to keep him in sight and remain unseen. This was not hard for a man
given to mountain-climbing, almost the only sport left to one who thought
it immoral to hurt anybody but himself.

Taking advantage of shop-windows, omnibuses, passers-by, and other bits
of cover, he prosecuted the chase up the steepy heights of Campden Hill.
But soon a nearly fatal check occurred; for, chancing to take his eyes
off Hughs, he saw the little model returning on her tracks. Ready enough
in physical emergencies, Hilary sprang into a passing omnibus. He saw
her stopping before the window of a picture-shop. From the expression of
her face and figure, she evidently had no idea that she was being
followed, but stood with a sort of slack-lipped wonder, lost in
admiration of a well-known print. Hilary had often wondered who could
possibly admire that picture--he now knew. It was obvi