as even written a letter to him
asking him to come to her, pressing forward their marriage, and I am to
be the bearer of it to him. This is only a woman's whim. She insists
that I must see once the man who is to be her husband.

So, after all, the tragedy of Dr Wedderburn is not to be repeated. I--I
shall not hear, stealing along the steep and windy streets of Edinburgh,
any--any strange footsteps.

* * * * *

What is the awful fate that pursues me? A year ago I left Edinburgh
carrying with me the letter which I understood to contain the request
of Kate Walters to her lover, Hugh Fraser, to hasten on their marriage.
As the train roared southwards, I congratulated myself on my clever
management of a woman. I had, it is true, stepped in between Kate and
the calm happiness she had been anticipating when I first met her in the
hospital ward. But now I had withdrawn. And, I told myself, in time. All
would be well. This girl would marry the boy who loved her. She would
deceive him. He would never know that the girl he married was not the
girl he originally loved. He would never perceive that a human being had
intervened between her and purity, truth, honour. In this letter--I
touched it with my fingers, congratulating myself--Hugh Fraser would
read the summons to the future he desired, the future with Kate Walters.
His soul would rush to meet hers, and surely, after a little while, hers
would cease to hold back. She would really once more be as she had been.
I forgot that no human soul can ever retreat from knowledge to
ignorance.

Hugh Fraser's rooms in London were in Piccadilly. Directly I arrived in
town I wrote him a note, saying that I was from Edinburgh with a message
from Kate Walters for him. I explained that she had nursed me through a
severe illness, and hoped I might have the pleasure of making his
acquaintance. In reply, I received a most friendly note, begging me to
call at an hour on the evening of the following day.

That evening I drove in a hansom from the Grand Hotel to Piccadilly,
taking Kate's note with me. I was conscious of a certain excitement, and
also of a certain moral exultation. Ridiculously enough, I felt as if I
were about to perform a sort of fine, almost paternal act, blessing
these children with genuine, as opposed to stage, emotion. Yes; I glowed
with a consciousness of personal merit. How incredible human beings are!
Arrived at Hugh Fraser's rooms, I was a