en all is said and done, it is the poor man I pity!"

"You said within twelve months."

"That was a bow drawn at a venture. It may be a little sooner; it may
be a little later. But--next week or next month--it is coming: it is
coming!"

June smiled upon us once more; and on the afternoon of the 13th, the
anniversary of our first lunch together at the Le Geyts, I was up at my
work in the accident ward at St. Nathaniel's. "Well, the ides of June
have come, Sister Wade!" I said, when I met her, parodying Caesar.

"But not yet gone," she answered; and a profound sense of foreboding
spread over her speaking face as she uttered the words.

Her oracle disquieted me. "Why, I dined there last night," I cried; "and
all seemed exceptionally well."

"The calm before the storm, perhaps," she murmured.

Just at that moment I heard a boy crying in the street: "Pall mall
Gazette; 'ere y'are; speshul edishun! Shocking tragedy at the West-end!
Orful murder! 'Ere y'are! Spechul Globe! Pall Mall, extry speshul!"

A weird tremor broke over me. I walked down into the street and bought
a paper. There it stared me in the face on the middle page: "Tragedy
at Campden Hill: Well-known Barrister Murders his Wife. Sensational
Details."

I looked closer and read. It was as I feared. The Le Geyts! After I left
their house, the night before, husband and wife must have quarrelled,
no doubt over the question of the children's schooling; and at some
provoking word, as it seemed, Hugo must have snatched up a knife--"a
little ornamental Norwegian dagger," the report said, "which happened
to lie close by on the cabinet in the drawing-room," and plunged it
into his wife's heart. "The unhappy lady died instantaneously, by all
appearances, and the dastardly crime was not discovered by the servants
till eight o'clock this morning. Mr. Le Geyt is missing."

I rushed up with the news to Nurse Wade, who was at work in the accident
ward. She turned pale, but bent over her patient and said nothing.

"It is fearful to think!" I groaned out at last; "for us who know
all--that poor Le Geyt will be hanged for it! Hanged for attempting to
protect his children!"

"He will NOT be hanged," my witch answered, with the same unquestioning
confidence as ever.

"Why not?" I asked, astonished once more at this bold prediction.

She went on bandaging the arm of the patient whom she was attending.
"Because... he will commit suicide," she replied, without moving