evil Leon Hamar--and if one can place any reliance
at all, on the ravings of a sick man, a devil, Leon Hamar undoubtedly
is. What a pity it is Shiel hasn't money."

These remarks were naturally not without effect on Gladys, and she
could not help growing more and more interested in the man, whose love
for her had proved so deep-rooted and ideal, that he had practically
sacrificed his life, in an attempt to serve her. Finally, she found
herself awaiting her aunt's daily report of his illness with an
anxiety that was almost acute.

In the meanwhile, John Martin came home one evening in a rare state of
excitement.

"What do you think!" he exclaimed, throwing a bundle of letters on the
table, "one of Dick's speculations has turned out trumps, after all.
He had invested several thousands of pounds--in Shiel's name--in
enamel-ivorine, the new stuff for stopping teeth, which looks exactly
like part of the teeth. I remember I thought it an absurd venture at
the time, but for once in a way I was wrong--"

"Ahem!" interrupted Gladys.

"There has been a sudden boom in the patent, every dentist is using
it, and, as a consequence, the shares have risen enormously. I've
heard from Dick's lawyer to-day that Shiel is now worth fifty thousand
pounds!"

"Good heavens!" Miss Templeton ejaculated, "and Gladys has bound
herself to Hamar! I suppose," she said afterwards, when John Martin
and she were alone together, "that you would not have any objection to
Shiel now, if Gladys were free to marry him."

"Certainly not!" John Martin said, "certainly not, I always liked
Shiel. A fine manly young fellow, very different to the type one
usually meets nowadays. I only wish Gladys were free!"

"You would raise no obstacle to her becoming engaged to Shiel?"

"None whatsoever! But what's the good of talking about an
impossibility. Gladys is stubbornness itself--when once she has made
up her mind to do a thing, nothing in God's world will make her not do
it."

"Wait," Miss Templeton said, "wait and see. I think I can see a
possible way out of it."

She had learned much from Shiel in his "wanderings." He had constantly
alluded to Hamar, Curtis, Kelson--and Lilian Rosenberg; to the great
compact, and to the one possible way of breaking that compact--namely
through the instigation of a quarrel between the trio. From several of
the statements he had made, Miss Templeton deduced that Kelson was
greatly under the influence of Lilian Rosenberg