'And here, under this roof, sleeps my gentle sister Kate, and all the good and kindly people of the place. Are they all but ripples on the stream? 'And she, my Marie, she who is dearer than all the world beside, is she to be to me only for the span of this poor vulgar world, wherein love and time are broken up by the round of petty daily cares? Am I to clasp her in this world only to lose her in the next? I, who spent all my youth in visions of perfected love hereafter! I who held that we were sent on earth merely to learn love, that we might hereafter enjoy it in the peace as unencumbered souls!' He paused awhile, drew back from the window. He put his hand to his head in a bewildered way. He took down his hands, crying out, in a low, resolute voice,-- 'No, no. No, no, no. That is absurd. Quite absurd. I must be losing my reason. Staying up at night is bad, everyone says, and everyone is always right. You may stay up a night now and then, but not two nights in such quick succession as these two. 'I can't sleep, and I don't want to read or to think. What should I do? 'Go out for a walk and get the jaded look off my face before my love, my Marie, comes down. Yes; that is a good idea.' He changed his clothes, stole quietly down the stairs, took his overcoat off the hall rack, and went out. The morning was damp, and raw, and cold. He had no definite intention. He wandered about the streets aimlessly. He did not know whither he went. He did not care what road he took. He simply wanted to kill time and thought by walking. The streets had not awoke yet. Life beat in languid pulses at the crossings where great courses of traffic crossed one another. Odd cabs rolled by, carrying figures, well muffled up, to and from early trains. The 'All hot!' men still lingered in important thoroughfares. London would not be awake for an hour. London would not be at work for two. At the usual hour the breakfast-bell rang. Shortly afterwards it was found Mr Osborne and Mr Nevill had gone out and had not returned, and that the latter had left word he should not be back for the day. CHAPTER VIII. DERELICT WOMEN. 'Good gracious!' cried white-haired Mrs Barclay from the top of the table, 'what can have happened to the two? They must have gone out together. Gone out a raw wretched morning like this without breakfast! I never heard of such a thing. Miss Osborne, have you any notion of what has become of your brother?' 'No, Mrs Barclay, not the least. He said nothing about it last night, and he left no message. Perhaps he got a letter or telegram this morning obliging him to go out early.' 'Maybe so. Maybe so! I'll ring and ask. Without his breakfast such a morning! Why, it's enough to give him his death.' A servant answered. 'Did you take the letters out of the box this morning?' 'Yes, ma'am.' 'Were there any for Mr Osborne?' 'No, ma'am.' 'Nor a telegram?' 'No, ma'am.'