Once more, once more, she had to go forth to the unpleasant interview. All was unpleasant connected with it; the object, the journey, the very house, and Mr. Alfred King himself: but she was obeying the command of her dead father, she was seeking to save the reputation, perhaps the life, of her living brother; and Sara Davenal was not one to shrink on her own account from responsibilities such as these. But surely the spirit of mischief was in it all? It seemed like an evil fate upon her--at least, so she thought in her vexation. For on this day, as on the other, she encountered Mr. Oswald Cray. Not at the offices, but at the gate of the Temple garden. It occurred in this way. As before, she found she had to wait a considerable time before she could see Alfred King, and she wandered into the quiet courts of the Temple, and came to the larger garden. The gate-keeper would not admit her to it at first; she had not the _entrée_, he said; but she told him her case: that she was a stranger, and had to wait an hour and a half to keep an appointment at a solicitor's in Essex Street. Her sweet face and her plaintive tone--for the voice catches the mind's sorrow--won him over, and, though he grumbled a little, he let her enter. It was peaceful there; shut in from the world's turmoil: the grass was green, and the paths were smooth; and Sara sat on the bench alone, and watched the river steamers as they passed and repassed on the Thames. It was in leaving the gardens that she encountered Mr. Oswald Cray. He had business that day with a barrister in chambers, and was passing the gate as she was leaving it. Sara shrank within the gate again, in the hope that he might not accost her. It was a vain hope. Surprised to see her there, so far from home and alone, he inquired the reason in the moment's impulse. The crimson blush, called into her face at the meeting, faded to paleness as she answered: "An appointment." She could not say she was there for pleasure. And, besides, that utter weariness of spirit, when we no longer struggle against fate, had grown to be hers. It seemed of little moment whether he knew her errand that day or not: a faintness of heart, not unlike despair, was weakening her energies. "An appointment?" he repeated. "Not at the place where I saw you before? Not with Mr. Alfred King?" "Yes, that is where I am going," she replied, feeling she could not battle against the questions. "I was to have seen Mr. Allred King at twelve; but I was late, and so I have to wait for him." "But it is not expedient that you should go there," said Oswald. "I must go there," she answered, all too energetically in her desperation. "Were the interview to lead to--to my death, and I knew that it would, I should go."