myself, determined to keep us apart. Why had she
discontinued her journey; and had she returned to England,--to the
Cayleys? If not, where was she now? Unanswerable questions, of course.
All I could do was to possess my soul in patience, and hope for tidings
when I reached my destination. And meanwhile, by breaking my journey
here, for the sole purpose of seeing her, I had incurred a delay of
twelve hours.

One thing at least was certain,--her father could not have left Berlin
for the purpose of meeting her _en route_, or he would not have
started from the Friedrichstrasse station.

With a rush all the doubts and perplexities that I had kept at bay, even
since I received Anne's post-card, re-invaded my mind; but I beat them
back resolutely. I would not allow myself to think, to conjecture.

I moped around aimlessly for an hour or two, telling myself that Berlin
was the beastliest hole on the face of the earth. Never had time dragged
as it did that morning! I seemed to have been at a loose end for a
century or more by noon, when I found myself opposite the entrance of
the Astoria Restaurant.

"When in difficulties--feed," Jim Cayley had counselled, and a long
lunch would kill an hour or so, anyhow.

I had scarcely settled myself at a table when a man came along and
clapped me on the shoulder.

"Wynn, by all that's wonderful. What are you doing here, old fellow?"

It was Percy Medhurst, a somewhat irresponsible, but very decent
youngster, whom I had seen a good deal of in London, one way and
another. He was a clerk in the British Foreign Office, but I hadn't the
least idea that he had been sent to Berlin. He had dined at the Cayleys
only a week or two back.

"I'm feeding--or going to feed. What are you doing here?" I responded,
as we shook hands. I was glad to see him. Even his usually frivolous
conversation was preferable to my own meditations at the moment.

"Just transferred, regular stroke of luck. Only got here last night;
haven't reported myself for duty yet. I say, old chap, you look rather
hipped. What's up?"

"Hunger," I answered laconically. "And I guess that's easily remedied.
Come and join me."

We talked of indifferent matters for a time, or rather he did most of
the talking.

"Staying long?" he asked at last, as we reached the coffee and liqueur
stage. We had done ourselves very well, and I, at least, felt in a much
more philosophic frame of mind than I had done for some hours past.

"No, o