"If anybody is to be praised for the discovery of the truth as
manifested to-night," he went on presently, "that praise should go to
Loisette alone. He has said--that wise Frenchman--that 'the likeness of
events acting upon a highly strung and overwrought mind is likely to
produce exactly similar results.' There is his vindication before you.
Last night all hope of happiness was smitten out of that poor girl's
mind by the affair at Clavering Close and the certainty that she had
lost the man she loves forever. This morning new hope came; this evening
that new hope was dashed to earth again by her interview with this dear
boy, and the future looked blacker and more hopeless than ever. The
'likeness of events' had come; there is the 'likeness of result' before
you. Back into her ball dress, back into her cloak, back into everything
that had to do with that other time; there she goes now back to Gleer
Cottage as well!"

"God!" said Geoff, with a queer sort of sob; then leaned his curved arm
against a tree trunk and hid his face in the crook of it. "And to think
what I said to her, what I thought of her! I ought to be kicked for a
brute. And yet I wouldn't have hurt her for all the world--my dear, dear
girl!"

"Buck up, my boy, buck up!" said Cleek, patting him on the shoulder,
"The world can do with all the brutes of your kind that can be created;
for they make good sons, good husbands, and loyal gentlemen! She said,
did she not, that she would 'show you something that would light the way
back to the land of happiness'? Well, she's doing it, my boy; and if you
were to follow her this minute you'd find history repeating itself down
to the smallest detail. Only, you _mustn't_ follow her; you mustn't let
history repeat itself, Clavering. Gleer Cottage is not in the same
lonely and unwatched state to-night that it was in last night. The
police are there. They mustn't see what happens, because I've a fancy
for keeping some things with regard to this case off the annals of
Scotland Yard and out of the courts of England. You must stop her, you
and Miss Lorne."

"Stop her? How? Isn't it dangerous to wake a sleep-walker?"

"Yes, if it's done rudely. But people in that condition will answer
questions, and---- Who spoke first, when you met last night?"

"Why, I did, of course. I was so bowled over when I looked up and
recognized her that I said: 'Kathie! Great Scott, is it you?' before I
thought. That's how she came to speak to