"Ho, ho, thatt's how it is--your fine wife's done with you, and yet you won't be in with me! Come, Alf," she said in a persuasive tone. "I'll get you a nice prawn curry for the sake of old times, late though it is. What a good thing I was taking a gasp of air past midnight!" "Out of my way, girl! Do you wish to drive me mad?" cried Rayner, as he forcibly detached the girl's hand from his arm and pushed her against the wall, while he took to his heels and ran till at length, hearing no footsteps behind him, he concluded that he had got rid of his tormentor, and slackened his pace. "I wonder if the spiteful minx did really go and pour out her venom on Hester? Well, I feared it might come, and now that everything is tumbling about my ears it doesn't much matter. There's no future for us in Madras, that's clear, but I've sharp wits, I'll make a living at home--and the Bellairs have influence. Hester will never forsake me," he murmured with an encouraged air. "We'll set sail at once for England." He was now passing a riotous haunt, which even at this hour echoed with boisterous voices and laughter, and flaring lights streamed from the verandah where loungers drank and smoked, but he turned away his eyes in disgust and sped on his way. As he walked along one of the more secluded roads of Vepery, his eye lighted on a white gate on which was written, in letters that he could trace in the clear moonlight--Freyville. "Why, that's the name of _his_ house," he muttered, staring with fascinated eyes on the abode of his father. "Strange that I should have stumbled on it to-night of all nights!" It had a placid, winning air; two of the wide windows which gave on the verandah stood open and a light burned within. He could see a grey head bending over a big book which lay on a table. For a brief moment a sudden impulse came to the fugitive in his desperate plight. Should he walk in and present himself to the old man? A swift intuition whispered that even after all that had come and gone a hand would be held out at the eleventh hour to save him. The threatening hoofs of the Australians, the insulting words spoken in his verandah, and the repudiation at the beach--all would be blotted out by that one word "father"; ay, and more, the means to extricate him from the pit which he had digged for himself and into which he had fallen, would most surely be forthcoming. Even now it was not too late to compromise with Zynool and the Bank. The man seated there could doubtless do it for him. Would he say that needful word, he asked himself, as he laid his hand on the latch of the white gate. Just at that moment, the silent reader in the silent room raised his head. The searching eyes looked out as if stirred by some consciousness that something untoward was afoot.