"Why shouldn't I get clear out of the whole business?" he said. "I could leave the country to-morrow with this money, and go out and join Uncle James, and make my fortune by and by. Why should I stick to Louisa when I hate her? It's all over with Alison and me. Oh, Alison, how could you love another fellow when I loved you so well, and was so true to you? I can't understand it--no, I can't. I don't believe for a moment that she was telling me the truth the other day--why, there is no other fellow. I have made inquiries and I can't hear of anyone. It isn't as if hundreds wouldn't want her, but she is keeping company with no one. I believe it was an excuse she made; there's a mystery at the bottom of it. Something put her out, and she was too proud to let me see what it was. And, oh dear, why was I so mad as to propose marriage to a girl like Louisa Clay? Yes; why shouldn't I get quit of the thing to-night? I have the money now. I can take Uncle James's advice to-night; why shouldn't I do it?" Jim stood straight up as these thoughts came to him. He slipped the foreign letter into his pocket, walked with a long stride to the window, flung the sash open, and looked out into the night. "I can't do it," he muttered; "it isn't in me to be an out-and-out scoundrel. She is not the girl I want, but I have promised her, and I must stick to it; all the same, I am a ruined man. Oh, if Alison had only been true to me." "Now, old chap, what are you grumbling to yourself for?" said a voice just behind him. He turned abruptly and met the keen-eyed, ferret-looking face of the detective Sampson. Sampson and Jim had not been very friendly lately, and Jim wondered now in a vague sort of way why his quondam friend had troubled himself to visit him. "Sit down, won't you?" he said abruptly. "There's a chair." "I'll shut the door first," said Sampson. "I have got a thing or two to say to you, and you may as well hear me out. You aint behaved straight to me, Jim; you did a shabby thing behind my back; but, Lor' bless you, ef it's saved me from a gel like Louisa Clay, why, I'll be obleeged to you to the end of my days. Look here, I was very near committing myself with that girl. 'Twasn't that I loved her, but I don't go for to deny that she was good-looking, and she certainly did tickle my fancy considerable, and then when I thought of the tidy bit of silver that she would have from her father, I made up my mind that she would be a good enough match for me; but mind you, I never thought her straight--I never yet was mistook in any character I ever studied carefully. I couldn't follow out my calling if I did, Jim, old chap; and that you know well." "I don't suppose you could, George," said Jim; "but I think it only fair to tell you before you go a step further, that I am engaged to Louisa, and I can't hear her run down by anyone now. So you may as well know that first as last."