he row. "Miss
Falconer has promised to be my wife!"

A silence, so sudden as to be startling, fell upon the hot and crowded
room; then, as Sir Stephen grasped his son's hand, a din of voices
arose, an excited buzz of congratulations and good wishes. Stafford
faced them all, his face pale and set, his lips curved with a forced
smile, his eyes flashing, but lit with a sombre fire. There was a smile
on his lips, a false amiability in his eyes, but there was so much of
madness in his heart that he was afraid lest at any moment he should
dash the glass to the ground and break out into cursing.

An hour later he found himself in his room, and waving Measom away from
him, he went to the window and flung it wide open, and stood there with
his hands against his throbbing brow; and though no word came from his
parched lips, his heart cried:

"Ida! Ida!" with all the agony of despair.

CHAPTER XXIV.

The hours dragged along as Stafford faced the tragedy of his life. As
he paced the room or flung himself into a chair, with his head bowed in
his hands, the effects of the wine he had taken, the suppressed
excitement under which he had laboured, passed away, and in the
reaction his brain cleared and he began to realise the terrible import
of the step he had taken, the extent of the sacrifice he had made. His
own life was wrecked and ruined irreparably; not only his own, but that
of the girl he loved.

The step he had taken was not only irreparable but irrevocable; he
could not go back. He had asked Maude Falconer to be his wife, he had
spoken words which must have sounded to her as words of love, he had
kissed her lips. In a word, he was pledged to her, and the pledge could
not be broken.

And Ida! What should he do in regard to her? He had promised that if
his feelings underwent any change towards her he would not go and tell
her. And at that moment, he felt that the promise had not been a vain
one; for he knew that he could not go to her, that at sight of her his
resolution would melt like snow in the sun, that his love for her would
sweep him away on a torrent of passion, and that he would be as false
to Maude Falconer as he had been to Ida.

And yet he could not leave her, desert her--yes, that was the
word!--without making some sign, without speaking one word, not of
excuse, but of farewell. What could he say to her? He could not tell
her the truth; for his father's sake that must never be divulged; he
could give