honour. Tell me, please, there's no more of you hereabouts.
It's a long passage to and fro: and if you're a man, you'll see that
I'm almost as crowded as you are lonesome. Don't start me beating
_all_ this brush for skunks!'

"--He sailed me back to Valparaiso, after we had spent three days
prospecting the property together. At Lima I left him to fight out
details with the Minister of the Interior--who, for some mysterious
reason, turned out to be the person charged with trafficking for an
islet three hundred miles from any interior--while I trained north
and, crossing the Isthmus, sailed north for New York. The only man
I knew in the whole Western Hemisphere was a friend of mine there,
Renton by name, and I made for Renton, to raise capital.

"--I found that he could walk into Wall Street, and, arm-in-arm with
me, raise the money easily. Moreover I found that he had stored some
twelve thousand dollars for me as my share of an investment I'd
helped him to in Costa Rica. Some day, gentlemen, I'll tell you of
this little episode, if you care to hear about it. It was a deal in
a queer sort of mahogany he had asked me to inspect.

"--But to return to the island, and wind up. Hales found me there,
alive and hearty, Foe. For why? Because I had found a purpose in
me--to wait and, when time came, to hunt you to the ends of the
earth. It's _my_ turn now. You've taught me, and I'll improve on
your teaching. You've bought a practice, I've learnt; and now I
learn that you've fixed up to marry this Miss Denistoun.

"--Don't I know why? . . . Didn't I see that look in her eyes as she
walked past me, just now?

"--Yes. . . . Santa's look. . . . No secrets between you and me.
But, by God, you shan't! I'll save her from _that_. Sooner than she
shall be wife of yours, I'll marry her myself!"

"Mr. Farrell," said I, "you have learnt much and learnt it sorely:
but you haven't learnt enough. Pick up your hat, take your dog with
you, and walk out."

"That's right enough," said he; "and I'm going. I'm only half a
gentleman yet, and my feelings get the better of me in the wrong way.
But you'll never rob me of that fellow, and so I promise you two, and
him. . . . Come along, Rover!"

NIGHT THE TWENTY-THIRD.

COUNTERCHASE.

I went to the South Pacific, after all.

Farrell called on me, next day, and before I could countermand my
passage. He came, as he said, to offer me his deep apologies.
"I grant you, Si