the uncertainty of
our bosition, and the feeling that our friends were working behind our
backs. Now we know that this is so we shall vordify our souls to bear
the worst. But, tell me," he went on, "when you came here, surely you
must have subbosed that to tear me away from my wife would be very
bainful to her and to myself. You say now you never could do that, how
was it, then, you came?"

"Ah, sir!" cried Mr. Lavender, running his hands through his hair and
staring at the ceiling, "I feared this might seem inconsistent to your
logical German mind. But there are many things we public men would never
do if we could see them being done. Fortunately, as a rule we cannot.
Believe me, when I leave you I shall do my best to save you from a fate
which I perceive to be unnecessary."

So saying, he rose from the chair, and, picking up his hat, backed
towards the door.

"I will not offer you my hand," he said, "for I am acutely conscious
that my position is neither dignified nor decent. I owe you a tooth that
I shall not readily forget. Good-bye!"

XV.

And backing through the doorway he made his way down the stairs and out
into the street, still emotionalized by the picture of the two young
people holding each other by the waist. He had not, however, gone far
before reason resumed its sway, and he began to see that the red velvet
chair in which he had been sitting was in reality a wireless apparatus
reaching to Berlin, or at least concealed a charge of dynamite to blow
up some King or Prime Minister; and that the looking-glasses, of which
he had noticed two at least, were surely used for signalling to Gothas
or Zeppelins. This plunged him into a confusion so poignant that, rather
by accident than design, he found himself again at Hampstead instead of
at Scotland Yard. "In the society of Aurora alone," he thought, "can I
free myself from the goadings of conscience, for it was she who sent me
on that errand." And, instead of going in, he took up a position on his
lawn whence he could attract her attention by waving his arms. He had
been doing this for some time, to the delight of Blink, who thought it
a new game, before he saw her in her nurse's dress coming out of a
French-window with her yellow book in her hand. Redoubling his efforts
till he had arrested her attention, he went up to the privet hedge, and
said, in a deep and melancholy voice:

"Aurora, I have failed in my duty, and the errand on which you sent me