t Varrick's life that he never looked back to
without shuddering. How he passed the long hours he never knew. Gerelda
grew steadily more violent, and twice Varrick's life would have paid the
forfeit had it not been for his watchfulness.

With great difficulty he succeeded, with the doctor's assistance, in
making the change from the train to the boat.

That was how his wedding journey began.

As night came on, the doctor touched him again on the arm.

"You have not left your young bride's side for an instant during all
these long hours," he said. "You are wearing yourself out. Let me beg of
you to go out on deck and take a few turns up and down; the cool air
will revive you. Nay, you must not refuse; I insist upon it, or I shall
have you for a patient before your journey is ended."

To this proposition, after some little coaxing, Varrick consented.

The doctor was quite right; the cool air did revive him amazingly. He
felt feverish, and paced up and down the deck, a prey to the bitterest
thoughts that ever tortured a man's soul.

One by one the stars came out in the great blue arch overhead, and
mirrored themselves in the bluer waters.

Varrick watched them in silence, his heart in a whirl. All at once it
occurred to him that he knew the pilot of the boat--that, as he was from
Montreal, it wouldn't be a bad idea to interview him as to the location
of some private asylum to which he might take Gerelda.

He acted upon this thought at once, and making his way to the upper
deck, he recognized the man at the wheel, in the dim light, although his
back was turned to him.

"How are you, John?" he exclaimed, tapping him on the shoulder. "Don't
let me frighten you; it is your old friend Varrick."

Much to his surprise, the pilot neither stirred nor spoke. Varrick
stepped around, and faced him with some little laughing remark on his
lips. But the words died away in his throat in a gasp. The dim light was
falling full upon the pilot's features. What was there in that ashy face
and those staring eyes that sent the cold blood back to his heart?

"John!" he cried, bending nearer the man and catching hold of his arm
roughly as it rested upon the wheel. But his own dropped heavily to his
side.

The terrible truth burst upon him with startling force--the pilot was
dead at the wheel!

But even in the same instant that he made his horrible discovery, a
still greater one dawned upon him. Another steamer came puffing and
pant