He was sorry to be leaving the teeming London world, in which he had spent so much of his busy life--more sorry than anyone else could realise, he reflected grimly. Possibly, to the rest of mankind, a practice in South London might not appear the acme of bliss--a practice that dealt almost exclusively with the sordid, the poor, even the criminal; but--he loved his work, he loved his people; it was intolerably hard to tear himself away from them all, and yet--the tearing was inevitable. "I can't stay here within measurable reach--of her--and of temptation, and--play the man," his reflections ran on, "so--so I must run away." He laughed shortly, as he picked up the two letters from his table, and re-read them, feeling absurdly disinclined to reply to either. He knew he must go. With the unwavering directness of an upright man, when making a decision, he had seen what he conceived to be the right path clearly marked for him; and, having seen it, he had no thought of drawing back from following it. But, with all his strength and decision of character, he nevertheless felt, at this juncture, a deep repugnance to writing those letters, which would, as he expressed it to himself, have the effect of burning his boats behind him. He knew that good work awaited him in that far western land, where he had determined to begin a new life; he knew, too, that to remain in England within call, as it were, of a temptation which his sense of what was right and honourable, bade him resist, was merely dallying with that sense of right; and yet, the human man within him, cried out against the necessity which he had faced, and acknowledged to be inevitable. Although he already actually knew the contents of those two letters by heart, he read both through again, then deliberately folded, and set them aside, with another short laugh. "If they are answered by to-night's post, it is time enough," he exclaimed. "They shall be answered to-night; these few hours of delay will make no difference." He was half-amused, half-ashamed of his own cowardice, as he called it, in postponing the inevitable, but a weight seemed to be lifted off his heart when those letters were set aside unanswered, when he turned away from the writing table, to go to his downstairs surgery, feeling that the conflagration of those boats of his had not yet begun.