I got into Grosvenor Square, passed through a throng of carriages, and saw the bright lights in a house where they were giving a birthday dance to which I had been specially invited months before. Helen would be there, I knew; I felt a jealous satisfaction in remembering that old Saxmundham was away, nursing his gout at Torquay. What of that? There were plenty of other men to step into my shoes. At first I thought I would stay, and walk up and down the square for the chance of one more look at her. How well I knew how she would come down the steps, in a timid hesitating way, half-dazzled by the lights she had just left, poising each little dainty foot a moment above the next step, flit into the carriage like a soft white bird, and drop her pretty head back with a sigh, 'Oh, I'm so tired, mamma!' her white throat curved gently above the swansdown of her cloak, the golden fringe of curls falling limply almost to her eyebrows. I must wait--I must see her again! What! On the arm of another man! The blood rushed into my head as these incoherent thoughts rose rapidly in my mind; all the passions of my life, of my youth, dammed up as they had suddenly been by my accident and its fatal consequences, seemed to surge up, break through the barriers of resignation and resolve, and make a madman of me. I was not master of myself, I could not count upon what I should do if I saw her; seeing my way no more than if I had been blind or intoxicated, I turned away, and finding myself presently in silent Bond Street, I got into a hansom and went back to my hotel. I fancied that night that sooner or later I should end by suicide; but in the morning I had to pack, to buy things for my journey, and to set out on my travels. The worst wrench was over; before I had left England a week, I was almost a philosopher. For five years I lived a wanderer's life, and found it fairly to my liking. I hunted the boar in Germany, the wolf in France, went salmon-fishing in Norway, shot two tigers in India; got as far as California in search of adventures, of which I had plenty; passed a fortnight with Red Indians, whom on the whole I prefer in pictures; and began to acquire a distaste for civilisation, mitigated by enjoyment of meetings once a year with Edgar and Fabian Scott.