We parted upon reaching London. Many kind words and wishes passed between us, and I gave him some well-meant, and, I believed, needed warnings. He was going down to see his uncle, the baronet. Then he had some matters to arrange with his lawyers, and above all, had to select a residence for himself and his wife. He would, no doubt, be in London for a short time. If possible he would come and see me. Any way he would write and let me know the exact date of his approaching marriage. If I could manage to come to it, so much the better. If not he would try, as they passed through town, to bring his bride to pay me a flying and friendly visit. He left me in the best of spirits, and I went back to my patients and worked hard to make up lost ground, and counteract whatever errors had been committed by my substitute. Some six weeks afterward--late at night--whilst I was deep in a new and clever treatise on zymotics, a man, haggard, wild, unshorn, and unkempt, rushed past my startled servant, and entered the room in which I sat. He threw himself into a chair, and I was horrified to recognize in the intruder my clever and brilliant friend, Charles Carriston! V. "The end has come sooner than I expected." These were the sad words I muttered to myself as waving my frightened servant away I closed the door, and stood alone with the supposed maniac. He rose and wrung my hand, then without a word sank back into his chair and buried his face in his hands. A sort of nervous trembling seemed to run through his frame. Deeply distressed I drew his hands from his face. "Now, Carriston," I said, as firmly as I could, "look up, and tell me what all this means. Look up, I say, man, and speak to me." He raised his eyes to mine, and kept them there, whilst a ghastly smile--a phantom humor--flickered across his white face. No doubt his native quickness told him what I suspected, so he looked me full and steadily in the face. "No," he said, "not as you think. But let there be no mistake. Question me. Talk to me. Put me to any test. Satisfy yourself, once for all, that I am as sane as you are." He spoke so rationally, his eyes met mine so unflinchingly, that I was rejoiced to know that my fears were as yet ungrounded. There was grief, excitement, want of rest in his appearance, but his general manner told me he was, as he said, as sane as I was. "Thank heaven you can speak to me and look at me like this," I exclaimed. "You are satisfied then?" he said. "On this point, yes. Now tell me what is wrong?" Now that he had set my doubts at rest his agitation and excitement seemed to return. He grasped my hand convulsively. "Madeline!" he whispered; "Madeline--my love--she is gone." "Gone!" I repeated. "Gone where?" "She is gone, I say--stolen from me by some black-hearted traitor--perhaps forever. Who can tell?" "But, Carriston, surely, in so short a time her love cannot have been won by another. If so, all I can say is--"