nk to her
credit. Then she went straight to him and to Anita, showed them proof of
the deposit, reviled them for their treatment of her, and swore that not
one farthing's benefit should accrue to Ulchester until Anita was turned
out of the house in the presence of their guests and the husband took
oath on his knees to join the wife in those daily prayers before the
caliph's mummy. Furthermore, Ulchester was to embrace the faith of the
Mohammedans that he might return with her at once to the land and the
gods she had offended by marriage with a Frankish infidel."

"Which, of course, he declined to do?"

"Yes. He declined utterly. But it was a case of the crushed worm, with
Zuilika. Now was _her_ turn; and she would not abate one jot or tittle.
There was a stormy scene, of course. It ended by Ulchester and the woman
Anita leaving the house together. From that hour Zuilika never again
heard his living voice, never again saw his living face! He seems to
have gone wild with wrath over what he had lost and to have plunged
headlong into the maddest sort of dissipation. It is known--positively
known, and can be sworn to by reputable witnesses--that for the next
three days he did not draw one sober breath. On the fourth, a note from
him--a note which he was _seen_ to write in a public house--was carried
to Zuilika. In that note he cursed her with every conceivable term; told
her that when she got it he would be at the bottom of the river, driven
there by her conduct, and that if it was possible for the dead to come
back and haunt people he'd do it. Two hours after he wrote that note he
was seen getting out of the train at Tilbury and going towards the
docks; but from that moment to this every trace of him is lost."

"Ah, I see!" said Cleek reflectively. "And you want to find out if he
really carried out that threat and did put an end to himself, I suppose?
That's why you have come to me, eh? Frankly, I don't believe that he
did, Major. That sort of a man never commits suicide upon so slim a
pretext as that. If he commits it at all, it's because he is at the end
of his tether--and our friend 'Zyco' seems to have been a long way from
the end of his. How does the lady take it? Seriously?"

"Oh, very, sir, very. Of course, to a woman of her temperament and with
her Oriental ideas regarding the supernatural, _et cetera_, that threat
to haunt her was the worst he could have done to her. At first she was
absolutely beside herself wi