"None in the world; and so far as Miss Kilsyth is concerned--her name is being bandied between us in the course of conversation, but it is my duty to say that I have not the smallest atom of complaint to make against her. To this hour, so far as I know, she is unacquainted with my feelings towards her, and can consequently be held responsible for no acts of hers at which I may feel aggrieved. But you must let me continue. I will not tell you what effect the intelligence of Miss Kilsyth's marriage had on me. I had been raised to the highest pinnacle of hope, I was cast down into the lowest depths of despair. That concerned no one but myself. I returned to England. Miss Kilsyth was Mrs. Ramsay Caird--I had learned that from the public prints--no private announcement, no wedding-cards awaited me. The story of my vast inheritance got wind, as such things do, and all my friends--all my acquaintance, let me say, to use a more fitting word, called on me or sent their congratulations. From your family, from Mrs. Ramsay Caird, I had not the slightest notice. The young lady whose life--if you credit her father--I had saved a few months previously, and her family, who professed themselves so grateful, ignored my existence. To this hour I have had no communication with Kilsyth, with Lady Muriel, with the Ramsay Cairds. I met Lady Muriel and her daughter once by the merest accident--an accident entirely unsought by me--and they bowed to me as though I were a tradesman who had been pestering for his bill. What am I to gather from this treatment? One of two things--either that I was regarded merely as the 'doctor' who was called in when his services were needed, but who, when he had fulfilled his functions and saved the patient, was no more to be recognised than the butcher when he had supplied the required joint of meat; or that, by those who knew, or thought they knew, the inner circumstances of the case, my moral character was so highly esteemed that, guessing I had been in love with Miss Kilsyth, it was judged expedient that I should have no opportunity of acquaintance with Mrs. Ramsay Caird. I ask you, Captain Kilsyth, which of these suppositions is correct?" Wilmot spoke with great warmth. Ronald Kilsyth looked on with wonder; he could scarcely imagine that the man who now stood erect before him with flashing eye and curled lips, every one of whose sentences rang with scorn, was the same being who, on the occasion of their last interview, had urged his suit so humbly, and accepted his dismissal with such resignation.