“I thought for a moment he would have killed me; and then he answered. I wish never again to invite a scene so appalling in its revelation of the secret abysses of wickedness. Utterly unnerved and overcome, I stammered out some propitiatory phrases, and escaped to my room. My only thought, my only hope was flight. I had a sum of money in my possession--for of late years my father had committed to me the business of our expenditure--and with that, and my small stock of jewels, I stole out in the grey of the next dawn, and made my way to Visp. I need not trouble you with the details of my flight--its happy accidents and living apprehensions. It is enough to say that I succeeded eventually in reaching London in safety. The experience of my later life had taught me wisdom and caution, and I was fortunate in keeping my head and my wits in somewhat bewildering circumstances. I parted with my jewels for a fair sum, and then, wishing to remove myself as far as possible from the likely arena of my persecutor’s enquiries, decided to bury myself in some obscure district of the suburbs, where I could rally my small forces, and think out the means to procure myself a livelihood. My travels combined with my early studies had made me fairly proficient in several European languages, and my father had always carried about with him for his correspondence a portable typewriter, which I had soon learned to manipulate. Finally, accident established me here, where I have now lived, in doubt and agitation, for a little over a week.” She ended, and for a full minute a profound silence succeeded her narration. “Pardon me,” said Gilead, then: “there is something more.” “The telegram?” she answered, with a broken, most pitiful sigh. “O! Mr Balm, I can only assume that, ambiguous as I had supposed my advertisement to be, _he_ must have seen and profited by it to get upon my tracks. It reached me only shortly before your arrival, and upon its receipt I had a short return of the illness with whose first attack he had been so fatally associated. He may be even here now, close by, somewhere in the neighbourhood!” She rose, with the word, in great agitation, and stood holding her hand to her bosom. Gilead rose also. “I beg you to calm yourself,” he said. “What have you to fear from him?” “Fear!” she whispered, with an awful significance. “Ah! you do not know him. He will _break_ me to his will.” “No, that must not be,” said the young man. “Has this creature no permanent address?” “Indeed none that I know of,” she faltered. “And the will was indisputable?” “Quite, I fear.” “We might contest it upon the grounds of undue influence? And in the meantime--” She gazed at him with her wide haunted eyes. Certainly the flowery lepidopteral ways had produced a very comely nymph. “Yes?” she whispered. “You must come with me, please.” “Mr Balm!” she exclaimed in astonishment. “Do you know what you say?”