At the end of the month several physicians, most skilled in mental disorders, had a consultation on his mother's case. The decision was unanimous--she was incurable. Could she live? Yes, with proper care, for years. Dr. Kérouec had a personal friend who made a specialty of these cases and took charge of only two or three patients at a time. Was this her only chance of getting well? Yes: if no chance could be called a chance. It was not an ordinary _maison de santé_, and here she would have the best of treatment, but it was expensive--fifteen hundred francs a month. Could she bear the journey to America? Never. Vane thanked the doctors and dismissed them all, except Dr. Kérouec. That night, for many hours, the young man paced the courtyard under his mother's window. At ten in the morning he asked to see the doctor and found him breakfasting. "I have decided," he said briefly. Dr. Kérouec extended his hand: "Ce brave jeune homme!" The next evening his mother was safely installed in the pretty little house near Rennes, where already Dr. Kérouec and his friend had privately made preparations. "And, my boy," said Dr. Kérouec (who was rich and knew all the circumstances by this time), "it is customary to pay in advance only when my friend does not know _ses gens_. I have told him that you will pay at the end of the year." Vane's voice faltered as he thanked the doctor, but he produced a bank note for five thousand francs and insisted upon leaving it then. That night Dr. Kérouec saw Vane safely on board the St. Malo packet. "I will care for her, my son," he said, with a parting pressure of the hand. "Ce brave jeune homme," he muttered, as he walked ashore and up the little Norman street, mopping his bald head (for it was a hot June evening) with a large red silk handkerchief. III. VANE had six hundred francs left; and, taking the Holyhead mail, the next evening he was on board the City of Richmond at Queenstown as a steerage passenger. He had been troubled with no further thoughts of adventure in the Soudan; and was quite indifferent as to his own _dénouement_. He spent a great deal of the time at sea walking on the deck; as a steerage passenger he was allowed to walk aft as far as the foremast. The other steerage passengers looked upon him as an intellectual young gentleman; probably a scholar in reduced circumstances.