'No,' said Selwyn, rubbing each wrist in turn to help to restore the circulation. Durwent laughed grimly. 'It's a wonder I didn't break something,' he said. 'Once more--I'm sorry. But you can understand the risk I am running in returning here with the police wanting me. They're not going to get me if I can help it.' 'Why didn't you stay away?' 'With the Old Country at war! Not likely. Do you think I should ever have gone if I had known what was going to happen?' 'What are your plans?' 'Fight,' said the other briefly. 'Somewhere--somehow. I'll get into a recruiting line about dawn to-morrow. . . . But--what can you tell me about Elise?' 'I have neither seen nor heard of her since August,' said Selwyn, wondering at the calm level of his own voice in spite of tumultuous heart-beats. 'Too bad. Then you don't know anything about the rest?' 'No. I'---- He paused awkwardly. 'I suppose you haven't heard about your brother?' There was no response, but Selwyn could feel the Englishman's eyes steeled on his face. 'He was killed,' he went on slowly, 'last August.' Still there was no sound from the younger son, now heir to his father's title and estates. For the first time Selwyn caught the ripple of the river's current eddying about the steps at the bottom. From the great bridges spanning the river there was the distant thunder of lumbering traffic. 'I understand that he died very bravely,' said the American in an attempt to ease the intensity of the silence. 'Yes,' muttered Durwent dreamily, 'he would. . . . So old Malcolm is dead. . . . Somehow, I always looked on his soldiering as a joke. I never thought that those fellows in the Regulars would ever really go to war. . . . Yet, when the time came, he was ready, and I was skulking off to China like a thief in the night.' The Englishman's voice was so low that it seemed as if he were talking more to himself than to his listener. 'What happened to that swine?' he ejaculated suddenly. 'I mean the one I almost killed. By any chance, did he die?' 'I saw in a paragraph last week,' said Selwyn, 'that he was out on crutches for the first time. The paper also commented on your complete disappearance.' 'I wish I had killed him,' said the young man grimly. 'If I ever get a chance I'll tell you about him. I was drunk at the time--that's what saved his life. If I had been sober I should have finished him. Well, it's a damp night, my friend, and I won't keep you any longer from a decent billet.' 'Look here, Durwent,' said Selwyn; 'come along to my rooms. You're soaked to the skin, and I could give you a change and a shakedown for the night.' 'Thanks very much; but I'm accustomed to this kind of thing.' 'You won't be seen,' urged Selwyn. 'I have accepted so much from your family that you would do me a kindness in coming.' 'Well, I must say I'm not married to this place. If you don't mind taking in a disreputable wharf-rat'----