ere anything to be
done for me, anything that will restore me to my former powers? Will you
credit me when I declare to you that it was only by making a terrible
effort that I was able to get away from Chichester's companionship and
to come down here? If I had not said that I meant to do so while you were
in the room, I doubt if I should ever have had the courage. There is
something inexplicable that seems to bind me to Chichester. Sometimes
there have been moments when I have thought that he longed to be far
away from me. And it has seemed to me that he, too, would find escape
difficult, if not impossible."

"You wish very much that Chichester should resign his curacy and go
entirely out of your life?" asked Malling.

"Wish!" cried Mr. Harding, almost fiercely. "Oh, the unutterable relief
to me if he were to go! Even down here, away from him for a day or two,
I sometimes feel released. And yet--" he paused in his walk--"I shall
have to go back--I know it--sooner than I meant to, very soon."

He spoke with profound conviction.

"Chichester will mean me to go back, and I shall not be able to stay."

"And yet you say it has occurred to you that possibly Chichester may be
as anxious as yourself to break away from the strange condition of things
you have described to me."

"Have you," exclaimed Mr. Harding--"have you some reason to believe
Chichester has ever contemplated departure?"

Malling moved slowly on, and the rector was forced to accompany him.

"It has occurred to me," he said, evading the point, "that possibly Henry
Chichester might be induced to go out of your life."

"Never by me! I should never have the strength to attempt compulsion with
Chichester."

"Some one else might tackle him."

"Who?" cried out Mr. Harding.

"Some man with authority."

"Do you mean ecclesiastical authority?"

"Oh, dear, no! I was thinking of a man like, say, Professor Stepton."

As Malling spoke, a curious figure seemed almost to dawn upon them,
sidewise, becoming visible gently in the darkness; a short man, with
hanging arms, a head poked forward, as if in sharp inquiry, and rather
shambling legs, round which hung loosely a pair of very baggy, light
trousers.

"And here is the professor!" said Malling, stopping short.

IX

That night when, very late, Mr. Harding and Malling returned to the red
doll's house and let themselves into it with a latch-key, they found
lying upon the table in the little hall a