lliery accident, and was greatly touched
by the gallant efforts of the rescuers who had to some extent been
successful. He insisted, too, on hearing what the various papers had
to say about his own case, listening sometimes with a quiet smile,
sometimes with a gleam of anger in his eyes. After a very abusive
article, which he had specially desired to hear, he leaned back with an
air of weariness.

"I'm rather tired of this sort of thing!" he said with a sigh. "What
will the 'Herald' do when it no longer has me to abuse?"

Of Drosser and of the events of that Sunday evening he spoke strangely
little. What he did say was, for the most part, said to Professor Gosse.

"You say I was rash to go alone," he replied when the professor had
opened the subject. "Well, that may be. It is not, perhaps, the first
time that in personal matters I've been lacking in due caution. But I
thought it would prevent a riot. I still think it did so."

"And what is your feeling about the whole matter?" asked the professor.
"Do you forgive Drosser for having given you this mortal injury?"

"One must bow to necessity," said Raeburn quietly. "When you speak of
forgiving I don't quite understand you; but I don't intend to hand down
a legacy of revenge to my successors. The law will duly punish the man,
and future atheists will reap the benefit of my death. There is, after
all, you know, a certain satisfaction in feeling that I died as I have
lived, in defending the right of free speech. I can't say that I could
not have wished that Drosser had made an end of me at nine-and-seventy
rather than at nine-and-forty. I shall live on in their hearts, and that
is a glorious immortality! The only immortality I have ever looked for."

In the afternoon to the astonishment of all, Mr. Fane-Smith came over
from Greyshot, horrified to hear that the man who he had once treated
with scant justice and actual discourtesy was lying on his death bed,
a victim to religious fanaticism. Spite of his very hard words to her,
Erica had always respected Mr. Fane-Smith, and she was glad that he had
come at the last. Her aunt had not come; she had hesitated long, but in
the end the recollection that Greyshot would be greatly scandalized, and
that, too, on the very eve of her daughter's wedding turned the scale.
She sent affectionate messages and a small devotional book, but stayed
at home.

Mr. Fane-Smith apologized frankly and fully to Raeburn for his former
discourtesy