ght judge by the haggard cheeks and the heavy
eyes; but he did not go to sleep. He did not even go to bed. He spent
the livelong night, as he had spent too many lately, in nervously pacing
to and fro within this hushed chamber; or seated with his arms on the
table, and the aching head resting on the clasped hands. And again
those wild visions came to torture him--the product of a sick heart and
a bewildered brain; only now there was a new element introduced. This
mad project of Hamish's at which he would have laughed in a saner mood,
began to intertwist itself with all these passionate longings and these
troubled dreams of what might yet be possible to him on earth; and
wherever he turned it was suggested to him; and whatever was the craving
and desire of the moment, this, and this only, was the way to reach it.
For if one were mad with pain, and determined to crush the white adder
that had stung one, what better way than to seize the hateful thing and
cage it so that it should do no more harm among the sons of men? Or if
one were mad because of the love of a beautiful white Princess--and she
far away, and dressed in bridal robes: what better way than to take her
hand and say, "Quick, quick, to the shore! For the summer seas are
waiting for you, and there is a home for the bride far away in the
North?" Or if it was only one wild, despairing effort--one last means of
trying--to bring her heart back again? Or if there was but the one
fierce, captured kiss of those lips no longer laughing at all? Men had
ventured more for far less reward, surely? And what remained to him in
life but this? There was at least the splendid joy of daring and action!

The hours passed; and sometimes he fell into a troubled sleep as he sat
with his head bent on his hands; but then it was only to see those
beautiful pictures of her, that made his heart ache all the more. And
sometimes he saw her all in sailor-like white and blue, as she was
stepping down from the steamer; and sometimes he saw the merry Duchess
coming forward through the ball-room, with her saucy eyes and her
laughing and parted lips; and sometimes he saw her before a mirror; and
again she smiled--but his heart would fain have cried aloud in its
anguish. Then again he would start up, and look at the window. Was he
impatient for the day?

The lamp still burned in the hushed chamber. With trembling fingers he
took out the letter Ogilvie had written to him, and held the slip of
prin