Pinney undressed rapidly, and before he climbed into the berth over Northwick's, he locked the door, and put the key under his pillow. Northwick did not seem to notice him, but a feeling of compunction made him put the key back in the door. "I guess I'd better leave it there, after all," he said. "It'll stop a key from the outside. Well, sir, good-night," he added to Northwick, and climbed to his berth with a light heart. Toward morning he was wakened by a groaning from the lower berth, and he found Northwick in great pain. He wished to call for help; but Northwick said the pain would pass, and asked him to get him some medicine he had in his hand-bag; and when he had taken that he was easier. But he held fast to Pinney's hand, which he had gripped in one of his spasms, and he did not loose it till Pinney heard him drawing his breath in the long respirations of sleep. Then Pinney got back to his berth, and fell heavily asleep. He knew it was late when he woke. The boat was at rest, and must be lying at her landing in Quebec. He heard the passengers outside hurrying down the cabin to go ashore. When he had collected himself, and recalled the events of the night, he was almost afraid to look down at Northwick lest he should find him lying dead in his berth; when he summoned courage to look, he found the berth empty. He leaped out upon the floor, and began to throw himself into his clothes. He was reassured, for a moment, by seeing Northwick's travelling-bag in the corner with his own; but the hand-bag was gone. He rushed out, as soon as he could make himself decent, and searched every part of the boat where Northwick might probably be; but he was not to be seen. He asked a steward how long the boat had been in; and the steward said since six o'clock. It was then eight. Northwick was not waiting for Pinney on the wharf, and he climbed disconsolately to his hotel in the Upper Town. He bet, as a last resource, that Northwick would not be waiting there for him, to give him a pleasant surprise, and he won his disastrous wager. It did not take his wife so long to understand what had happened, as Pinney thought it would. She went straight to the heart of the mystery. "Did you say anything about his going back?" "Why--in a general way," Pinney admitted, ruefully. "Then, of course, that made him afraid of you. You broke your word, Ren, and it's served you right." His wife was walking to and fro with the baby in her arms; and she said it was sick, and she had been up all night with it. She told Pinney he had better go out and get a doctor. It was all as different from the return Pinney had planned as it could be. "I believe the old fool is crazy," he said, and he felt that this was putting the mildest possible construction upon Northwick's behavior. "He seems to have known what he was about, anyway," said Mrs. Pinney, coldly. The baby began to cry. "Oh, _do_ go for the doctor!" V.