death he looked on now, but the swoon that is near
neighbor to it.

For a minute or two, he stood with his eyes fixed on the white calm
face beneath him, thinking. "If me and Zack," he whispered to himself;
"hadn't been brothers together--" He left the sentence unfinished, took
his hat quickly, and quitted the room.

In the passage down-stairs, he met one of the female servants, who
opened the street-door for him.

"Your master wants you," he said, with an effort. He spoke those words,
passed by her, and left the house.

CHAPTER XVII. MATTHEW GRICE'S REVENGE.

Neither looking to the right nor the left, neither knowing nor caring
whither he went, Matthew Grice took the first turning he came to,
which led him out of Baregrove Square. It happened to be the street
communicating with the long suburban road, at the remote extremity of
which Mr. Blyth lived. Mat followed this road mechanically, not casting
a glance at the painter's abode when he passed it, and taking no notice
of a cab, with luggage on the roof; which drew up, as he walked by,
at the garden gate. If he had only looked round at the vehicle for a
moment, he must have seen Valentine sitting inside it, and counting out
the money for his fare.

But he still went on--straight on, looking aside at nothing. He fronted
the wind and the clearing quarter of the sky as he walked. The shower
was now fast subsiding; and the first rays of returning sunlight, as
they streamed through mist and cloud, fell tenderly and warmly on his
face.

Though he did not show it outwardly, there was strife and trouble within
him. The name of Zack was often on his lips, and he varied constantly
in his rate of walking; now quickening, now slackening his pace at
irregular intervals. It was evening before he turned back towards
home--night, before he sat down again in the chair by young Thorpe's
bedside.

"I'm a deal better to-night, Mat," said Zack, answering his first
inquiries. "That good fellow, Blyth, has come back: he's been sitting
here with me a couple of hours or more. Where have you been to all day,
you restless old Rough and Tough?" he continued, with something of his
natural lighthearted manner returning already. "There's a letter come
for you, by-the-by. The landlady said she would put it on the table in
the front room."

Matthew found and opened the letter, which proved to contain two
enclosures. One was addressed to Mr. Blyth; the other had no direction.
The h