didn't exaggerate when he boasted that I'm
more "in his power" than ever. What a misfortune that Ellaline should
have come to Scotland--so near where we shall be, too, if we go to the
Roman Wall! He has only to tell the whole thing to Sir Lionel, and say:
"If you don't believe it, run up to such and such a place, and there you
will see the real Ellaline Lethbridge, whom perhaps you may recognize
from her likeness to your cousin, her dead French mother."

If only Ellaline were safely married! But she can't be yet, for days and
days, I'm afraid. She was to have written or telegraphed me at
Gloucester, if there were any chance of her soldier lover getting away
sooner than last expected; but I had no word from her at all, at the
Poste Restante there.

All that sounds bad enough for me, doesn't it? But there's worse to
come. The wretch swears he will (as he calls it), "give the show away"
to Sir Lionel to-morrow if I don't tell Sir L. myself that I have fallen
in love with Dick.

I said that Sir Lionel wouldn't believe me if I did, because I'd told
him at Torquay I wasn't in love with Dick. That admission slipped out,
and Sherlock Holmes caught at it. "Ah, I thought you'd done something to
put him off the scent!" he flashed out. "I call that downright
treacherous of you; and all the more I'll hold you down to your bargain
this time. I said I'd speak to-morrow unless you did what I told you to
do, but now I say I'll speak this minute, if you don't promise by all
that's sacred to ask him for his consent to-morrow. I'll shout to him
now. One--two--three!"

"Yes, yes, I will!" I cried--because Dick had worked himself up to such
a fury that I saw that he meant what he said.

"I shall know fast enough whether you keep your word or not," he
growled. "And if you don't, you understand just what you have to
expect."

If I hadn't given in to Ellaline! I ought to have known that nothing but
trouble could come of it. Yet no--I won't wish it undone. I can't! No
matter what happens, I shall never really regret what gave me the chance
of meeting a man like Sir Lionel. I don't think there is another in the
world. And to-morrow I am to have the honour of informing him that I'm
in love with that little worm, Dick Burden. Having seen the sun, I love
a flicker of phosphorus on a sulphur match.

Do write me the minute you get this, won't you? No, telegraph if you can
think of anything consoling to say. Poste Restante, Chester.

Your fr