aces of the passers-by. As the day waned, he
found himself once again for the twentieth time in the park, pacing in
"the dim, persistent rain," which had been falling all day.

But he could not get away from the distant roar of the traffic. He
heard it everywhere, like the Niagara which he had indeed escaped, but
the sound of which would be in his ears till he died. He drew nearer and
nearer to the traffic, and stood still in the rain listening to it
intently. Might one of those thousand wheels be even now bringing his
enemy towards him, to force him to keep his unspoken word. Hugh had not
realized that his worst enemy was he who stood with him in the rain.

The forlorn London trees, black and bare, seemed to listen too, and to
cling closer to their parks and grass, as if they dimly foresaw the
inevitable time coming when they too should toil, and hate, and suffer,
as they saw on all sides those stunted uprooted figures toil and suffer,
which had once been trees like themselves. "We shall come to it," they
seemed to say, shivering in all their branches, as they peered through
the iron rails at the stream of human life, much as man peers at a
passing funeral.

The early night drove Hugh back to the house. He found a note, from a
man who had rooms above him, enclosing a theatre ticket, which at the
last moment he had been prevented using. He instantly clutched at the
idea of escaping from himself for a few hours at least. He hastily
changed his wet clothes, ate the food that had been prepared for him,
and hurried out once more.

The play was "Julius Caesar," at Her Majesty's. He had seen it several
times, but to-night it appealed to him as it had never done before. He
hardly noticed the other actors. His whole interest centred in the awful
figure of Cassius, splendid in its unswerving deathless passion of a
great hate and a great love. His eyes never left the ruthless figure as
it stood in silence with its unflinching eyes upon its victim. Had not
Lord Newhaven thus watched him, Hugh, ready to strike when the hour
came.

The moment of the murder was approaching. Hugh held his breath. Cassius
knelt with the rest before Caesar. Hugh saw his hand seek the handle of
his sword, saw the end of the sheath tilt upwards under his robe as the
blade slipped out of it. Then came the sudden outburst of animal
ferocity long held in leash, of stab on stab, the self-recovery, the
cold stare at the dead figure with Cassius's foot upo