nificantly around the table.

Drake brought down his fist with a thump on to the mantelpiece. "Hold
your tongue, Robert! How often am I to tell you this is a different thing
entirely? Because I discover a creature of genius and try to help her to
the position she deserves----"

"You hypocrite, if it had been a man instead of a charming little woman
with big eyes, don't you know----"

But there had been a ring at the outer door, and Benson came in to say
that a clergyman was waiting downstairs.

"Little Golightly again!" said Lord Robert wearily. "Are these
everlasting arrangements never----"

The man stopped him. It was not Mr. Golightly; it was a stranger; would
not give his name; looked like a Catholic priest; had been there before,
he thought.

"Can it be---Talk of the devil----"

"Ask him up," said Drake. And while Drake bit his lip and clinched his
hands, and Lord Robert took up a scent bottle and sprayed himself with
eau de cologne, they saw a man clad in the long coat of a priest come
into the room--calm, grave, self-possessed, very pale, with hollow and
shaven cheeks and dark and sunken eyes, which burned with a sombre fire,
and head so closely cropped as to seem to be almost bald.

John Storm's anger had cooled. As he crossed the park the heat of his
soul had turned to fear, and while he stood in the hall below, with an
atmosphere of perfume about him, and even a delicate sense of a feminine
presence, his fear had turned to terror. On that account he had refused
to send up his name, and on going up the staircase, lined with prints, he
had been tempted to turn about and fly lest he should come upon Glory
face to face. But finding only the two men in the room above, his courage
came back and he hated himself for his treacherous thought of her.

"You will forgive me for this unceremonious visit, sir," he said,
addressing himself to Drake.

Drake motioned to him to be seated. He bowed, but continued to stand.

"Your friend will remember that I have been here before."

Lord Robert bent his head, and went on trifling with the spray.

"It was a painful errand relating to a girl who had been nurse at the
hospital. The girl was nothing to me, but she had a companion who was
very much."

Drake nodded and his lips stiffened, but he did not speak.

"You are aware that since then I have been away from the hospital. I
wrote to you on the subject; you will remember that."

"Well?" said Drake.

"I have onl