nswer it when we renew our conversation, which I propose to do very
shortly,' and he was gone before I could get in another word."

"But why should that make you go to Madeira?"

"Because, my dear, if I don't, so sure as I am a living woman, that
man will tire me out and marry me, and I dislike him, and don't want
to marry him. I have a strong will, but his is of iron."

And so it came to pass that the names of Mrs. Carr, Miss Terry, and
three servants, appeared upon the passenger list of Messrs. Donald
Currie & Co.'s royal mail steamship _Warwick Castle_, due to sail for
Madeira and the Cape ports on the 14th of June.

CHAPTER XXXII

Arthur arrived in town in a melancholy condition. His was a
temperament peculiarly liable to suffer from attacks of depression,
and he had, with some excuse, a sufficiently severe one on him now. Do
what he would he could not for a single hour free his mind from the
sick longing to see or hear from Angela, that, in addition to the
mental distress it occasioned him, amounted almost to a physical pain.
After two or three days of lounging about his club--for he was in no
mood for going out--he began to feel that this sort of thing was
intolerable, and that it was absolutely necessary for him to go
somewhere or do something.

It so happened that, just after he had come to this decision, he
overheard two men, who were sitting at the next table to him in the
club dining-room, talking of the island of Madeira, and speaking of it
as a charming place. He accepted this as an omen, and determined that
to Madeira he would go. And, indeed, the place would suit him as well
as any other to get through a portion of his year of probation in,
and, whilst affording a complete change of scene, would not be too far
from England.

And so it came to pass that on the morrow Arthur found himself in the
office of Messrs. Donald Currie, for the purpose of booking his berth
in the vessel that was due to sail on the 14th. There he was informed
by the very affable clerk, who assisted him to choose his cabin, that
the vessel was unusually empty, and that, up to the present time,
berths had been taken for only five ladies, and two of them Jewesses.

"However," the clerk added, by way of consolation, "this one,"
pointing to Mrs. Carr's name on the list, "is as good as a cargo," and
he whistled expressively.

"What do you mean?" asked Arthur, his curiosity slightly excited.

"I m