"Quite sure. And, as we ate, he told me many things, and among them of a life of wasted opportunities—of foolish riot, and prodigal extravagance, and of its logical consequence—want." "My poor Perry!" she murmured. "He spoke also of his love for a very beautiful and good woman, and its hopelessness." "My dear, dear Perry!" said she again. "And yet," said I, "all this is admittedly his own fault, and, as I think Heraclitus says: 'Suffering is the inevitable consequence of Sin, or Folly.'" "And he is well?" she asked; "quite—quite well?" "He is," said I. "Thank God!" she whispered. "Tell me," she went on, "is he so very, very poor—is he much altered? I have not seen him for a whole, long year." "Why, a year is apt to change a man," I answered. "Adversity is a hard school, but, sometimes, a very good one." "Were he changed, no matter how—were he a beggar upon the roads, I should love him—always!" said she, speaking in that soft, caressing voice which only the best of women possess. "Yes, I had guessed as much," said I, and found myself sighing. "A year is a long, long time, and we were to have been married this month, but my father quarrelled with him and forbade him the house, so poor Perry went back to London. Then we heard he was ruined, and I almost died with grief—you see, his very poverty only made me love him the more. Yesterday—that man—" "Sir Harry Mortimer?" said I. "Yes (he was a friend of whom I had often heard Perry speak); and he told me that my Perry lay at Tonbridge, dying, and begging to see me before the end. He offered to escort me to him, assuring me that I could reach home again long before dusk. My father, who I knew would never permit me to go, was absent, and so—I ran away. Sir Harry had a carriage waiting, but, almost as soon as the door was closed upon us, and we had started, I began to be afraid of him and—and—" "Sir Harry, as I said before, is an unpleasant animal," I nodded. "Thank Heaven," she pursued, "we had not gone very far before the chaise broke down! And—the rest you know." The footpath we had been following now led over a stile into a narrow lane or byway. Very soon we came to a high stone wall wherein was set a small wicket. Through this she led me, and we entered a broad park where was an avenue of fine old trees, beyond which I saw the gables of a house, for the stars had long since paled to the dawn, and there was a glory in the east. "Your father will be rejoiced to have you safe back again," said I. "Yes," she nodded, "but he will be very angry." And, hereupon, she stopped and began to pull, and twist, and pat her shining hair with dexterous white fingers, talking thus the while: