l that--I never blame them!"--cried Marcella--"but just now it
is so monstrous--so dangerous! Westall specially alert--and this gang
about! Besides, I got him work from Lord Maxwell, and made him promise
me--for the wife and children's sake."

Wharton shrugged his shoulders.

"I should think Westall is right, and that the gang have got hold of
him. It is what always happens. The local man is the catspaw.--So you
are sorry for him--this man?" he said in another tone, facing round upon
her.

She looked astonished, and drew herself up nervously, turning at the
same time to leave the room. But before she could reply he hurried on:

"He--may escape his risk. Give your pity, Miss Boyce, rather to
one--who has not escaped!"

"I don't know what you mean," she said, unconsciously laying a hand on
one of the old chairs beside her to steady herself. "But it is too late
to talk. Good-night, Mr. Wharton."

"Good-bye," he said quietly, yet with a low emphasis, at the same time
moving out of her path. She stopped, hesitating. Beneath the lace and
faded flowers on her breast he could see how her heart beat.

"Not good-bye? You are coming back after the meeting?"

"I think not. I must not inflict myself--on Mrs. Boyce--any more. You
will all be very busy during the next three weeks. It would be an
intrusion if I were to come back at such a time--especially--considering
the fact"--he spoke slowly--"that I am as distasteful as I now know
myself to be, to your future husband. Since you all left to-night the
house has been very quiet. I sat over the fire thinking. It grew clear
to me. I must go, and go at once. Besides--a lonely man as I am must not
risk his nerve. His task is set him, and there are none to stand by him
if he fails."

She trembled all over. Weariness and excitement made normal self-control
almost impossible.

"Well, then, I must say thank you," she said indistinctly, "for you have
taught me a great deal."

"You will unlearn it!" he said gaily, recovering his self-possession, so
it seemed, as she lost hers. "Besides, before many weeks are over you
will have heard hard things of me. I know that very well. I can say
nothing to meet them. Nor should I attempt anything. It may sound
brazen, but that past of mine, which I can see perpetually present in
Aldous Raeburn's mind, for instance, and which means so much to his good
aunt, means to me just nothing at all! The doctrine of identity must be
true--I must be the s