"Where are you going?" I asked. "Why do you leave?" "I am going to travel about. I have no intention of letting Ralph get hold of me. So I mean to go from place to place until I find Madeline." "Be careful," I urged. "I shall be careful enough. I'll take care that no doctors, surgeons, or even apothecaries get on my track. I shall go just as the fit seizes me. If I can't say one day where I shall be the next, it will be impossible for that villain to know." This was not a bad argument. In fact, if he carried out his resolve of passing quickly from place to place I did not see how he could plan anything more likely to defeat the intentions with which we credited his cousin. As to his finding Madeline by so doing, that was another matter. His idea seemed to be that chance would sooner or later bring him in contact with the man of his dream. However, now that the search had been intrusted to the proper persons his own action in the matter was not worth troubling about. I gave him many cautions. He was to be quiet and guarded in words and manner. He was not to converse with strangers. If he found himself dogged or watched by any one he was to communicate at once with me. But, above all, I begged him not to yield again to his mental infirmity. The folly of a man who could avoid it, throwing himself into such a state ought to be apparent to him. "Not oftener than I can help," was all the promise I could get from him. "But see her I must sometimes, or I shall die." I had now given up as hopeless the combat with his peculiar idiosyncrasy. So, with many expressions of gratitude on his part, we bade each other farewell. During his absence he wrote to me nearly every day, so that I might know his whereabouts in case I had any news to communicate. But I had none. The police failed to find the slightest clew. I had been called upon by them once or twice in order that they might have every grain of information I could give. I took the liberty of advising them not to waste their time in looking for the man, as his very existence was problematical. It was but a fancy of my friend's, and not worth thinking seriously about. I am not sure but what after hearing this they did not think the whole affair was an imagined one, and so relaxed their efforts. Once or twice, Carriston, happening to be in the neighborhood of London, came to see me, and slept the night at my house. He also had no news to report. Still, he seemed hopeful as ever. The weeks went by until Christmas was over and the New Year begun; but no sign, word, or trace of Madeline Rowan. "I have seen her," wrote Carriston, "several times. She is in the same place--unhappy, but not ill-treated." Evidently his hallucinations were still in full force. * * * * *