tone of a gentleman, and she was reluctant to refuse one who might turn out to be a friend of Captain le Breton's. "If you'll wait a minute, I'll see, sir," she said.

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Certainly," said Stracey, and he stepped in and took off his hat.

The girl went to the foot of the stairs, then, changing her mind, turned off and passed quickly to the kitchen: her mistress was the person to grapple with this new phase of these mysterious "goings on."

The moment she had gone Stracey heard Kyra's voice in the room above. He started, his lip twitched, and, after a second's hesitation, he ran lightly up the stairs and entered the room where the two girls were sitting.

Now, his disordered mind had formed no intention, no plan of action, when he had been forced, as if by some irresistible, occult influence, to follow Kyra. If there was any definite purpose it was only that of seeing who it was that so closely resembled the girl whom he had murdered, to satisfy the terror which had haunted him from the moment Kyra had "appeared" to him in the ball-room.

Terror is as insistent as love itself; and terror of the most horrible kind had got possession of him and was driving, drawing him, as a log is driven and dragged by the whirlpool. Only one thing could dispel that terror: the positive proof, by sight, by touch, and hearing, if possible, that the thing was not a ghost called up by his guilty conscience, but a real live woman who just happened to resemble Kyra. Once he had assured himself of this fact he would be at rest, at rest! He could face all else John Warden's violence, everything-but that apparition that had almost overthrown his reason, which had made it impossible for him to remain in the house, and had driven him out into the storm and mud of the streets.

The sitting-room door was open, and impelled, drawn, by his obsession, he entered without hesitation and noiselessly.

It was Bessie who saw him first, and for a second she sat and stared at him with distended eyes and speechless, stricken dumb by the sight of him, then she shrank back, gripping Kyra's arm in an agony of terror.

Kyra turned quickly, and she, too, gazed at the white, haggard face. She, also, was stricken dumb. Could it be possible that Bessie had brought her there to meet-Stracey Froyte!

The power of speech came to Bessie first.

"Save me, save me!" she panted, almost inaudibly, and

she flung herself upon Kyra and hid her face upon her breast, and so it befell that Kyra regarded him over the head of the girl he had wronged and deserted!

But Stracey Froyte's terror-stricken eyes were fixed on Kyra's face as if he saw nothing else.

"Speak! Speak!" he gasped, hoarsely, and in the hollow, toneless voice which is peculiar to the insane, to those who are suddenly deprived of reason by some terrible shock. "Who are you?"

A thrill of horror ran through Kyra; for instinctively she recognised the madness in his eyes and speech.

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"I am Kyra Jermyn," she said in a low voice. "And this is the girl you have so cruelly betrayed.'

"Kyra Jermyn, Kyra Jermyn!" he repeated, passing his hand over his forehead upon which the sweat stood in big drops. "Kyra Jermyn. No, no!" a cunning smile crept over his face. "She's dead. I know she's dead!"

A shudder shook Kyra.

"No," she said. "I am not dead, Stracey-"

"Stracey? You call me Stracey, as if you knew me! You! Who are you? You say that she's alive-that you

are You lie!"

He crept nearer to her, his hand extended, his fingers working, his eyes glaring with the ferocity of terror, for nothing is more cruel than the terror which was driving him mad. "Do you hear? You lie!"

Kyra sprang to her feet, but still with her arm round Bessie, who had fainted.

"Keep off!" she cried as calmly as she could, her eye meeting his steadily. "Do not touch her-or me! Leave this house-while you can. I will spare you, keep your

secret-"

an im

"Kyra? Kyra? She's dead! You-you are poster!" he hissed, as if he had not heard her, as, indeed, he had not. His hands were almost at her throat before Kyra called for help.

He laughed a mad laugh of derision and his hands closed. upon her shoulders and she was forced down upon her knees. "You're a devil sent to mock me!" he said, savagely. "A devil in her shape, with her face and voice; but I'm a match for you as I was for her. You Kyra! No, no! I know better; she's dead and buried-"

Kyra was fighting against the death-like sickness which preludes a swoon; the room was spinning round with her, the walls closing in upon her, she had no power to scream again

for help, and she was resigning herself to her fate when s step was heard leaping up the stairs, and the next moment Lance burst into the room.

He uttered no cry, not a word escaped him; he flung himself upon Stracey and forced him to relinquish his grasp upon Kyra. With a snarl Stracey grappled with him and a terrible struggle ensued, for Stracey was endowed with the proverbial strength of insanity and fought with hands and teeth. The landlady and the maid stood in the doorway screaming; but Kyra knelt beside the prostrate Bessie and watched the struggle with white face and racked heart.

Locked in a deadly embrace the two men wrestled as if for life; the table was overturned, upsetting the lamp, so that the room was suddenly plunged into semi-darkness, and in this dim light Kyra saw Lance now uppermost, now under his foe, as they rolled and plunged in their fight. Lance was, in ordinary circumstances, much the stronger of the two; but Stracey fought like one possessed by seven devils; and once he got his hands on Lance's throat, and, with a guttural cry of triumph, gripped it with a deadly grip; but Lance's muscular arms were round him and crushing the breath out of him, and Stracey was forced to loosen his grasp. The moment he did so Lance was on his feet again, and, exerting all his strength, flung Stracey against the French window which opened on to the balcony outside. The window went with a crash and Stracey fell amidst the shattered glass and woodwork; but as he fell he had dragged Lance down and was feeling for his throat again, when the two women at the door were thrust aside and Bertie rushed into the room.

"Hallo-why, what!" he cried; then he, too, flung himself upon Stracey.

In an instant Stracey ceased to struggle, and he looked towards the window, the blood streaming from his face, his eyes gleaming with a cunning smile, as horrible as it was sudden.

"I-I surrender!" he gasped. "Don't-don't hurt me!" "Look to him, Bertie!" cried Lance, and he sprang to Kyra's side.

He did not see Stracey suddenly dart through the window and Bertie disappear after him with a warning cry; he saw, was conscious of nothing but the white, lovely face looking up at him.

"Kyra!" he said, in a voice that thrilled through her.

That was all. He knew now that it was no ghost, that it was she herself, his wife.

"Lance!" she breathed.

He took her, almost in his arms, and held her, looking at her with all his soul in his eyes.

"Not dead, not dead!" he whispered, almost inaudibly.

She shook her head, and a blush rose to her face, called there by something in his gaze, then she remembered Bessie. "Oh-this poor, poor girl!" she said.

But Mrs. Simpkins and the girl were beside Bessie by this time, and with agitated cries were attempting to restore her. As if in a dream Lance saw them carry her out of the room.

He and Kyra were alone. For a moment or two they stood, she, with downcast eyes, he, regarding her with ardent, yet tender ones. At last she sank on to the sofa and he knelt beside her and took her hand.

"Kyra!" he whispered. "Tell me! Tell me all!"

He listened, still like a man in a dream, to the weird, the ghastly story of Stracey's villainy, and her desperate way of escape; his hand closing on hers at times with a fierce grip.

"Oh, my God, what you must have suffered!" broke from his lips once, as she told him in simple, unstrained language of her peril in the grim house at Heydon.

"And now?" he said, after a silence pregnant with emotion. "Now I have found you-now you have been restored to me -will you send me away, Kyra? Will you hold me to my bond, exact it to the utmost, to the last letter?"

She hung her head.

"Your-your face is cut-" she whispered, woman-like fencing with her happiness-"let me—”

Never mind my face," he responded, quickly. "Answer me. No, wait! Wait until I have told you what I should have told you the day we were married. Kyra, I loved you then-I was a fool, yes, a fool, to surrender you, to let you go! I ought to have taken you in my arms and kept you there. Yes, by force if necessary. I loved you, I have never ceased to love you-even when I thought you had gone from me for ever"-he shuddered. "Your memory was more precious to me than the love of any woman could be. I love you now with all my heart and soul. Will you send me away?"

She raised her eyes for an instant only; then she sighed. "I-I have brought you nothing but unhappiness and trouble. Better let me go-"

She moved to the door, as if she really meant to go; but he sprang to it, and locking it and putting the key in his pocket,

laughed yes, laughed his eyes alight with love, with derision at the idea of losing her again.

"No, no!" he said in the deep voice which was making such music in her heart. "No, no; not again, Kyra! You are my wife-my wife! Do you hear? Do you understand? I refuse to let you go. I insist-yes, insist-upon keeping you. Come to me!"

He held out his arms, his masterful eyes upon hers, devouring her, compelling her. To resist were impossible: her strength of will slipped from her. With half-shut eyes she swayed into his arms, and they closed round her as his lips met hers with their first kiss, the kiss of a passionate love that had lived even beyond the portals of death.

She was still in his arms, still listening to the sweetest words a woman can hear, her heart was still throbbing against his, when there came a knocking at the door, and Bertie's voice, husky and hurried, called:

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Open the door! Hi, Lance! You there? Open the door!" With a lingering kiss, Lance let Kyra withdraw from his embrace, and opened the door and Bertie entered, Bertie, hatless and with his coat torn and splashed with mud.

"Gone! clean gone!" he panted. "He climbed down the balcony like a cat and got a start. I caught sight of him on the Embankment, but he gave me the slip and Great heavens! who's this? Why-why-it's Miss Jermyn! The Miss Jermyn I knew in India, and saw-didn't I tell you I saw her at Holmby?-at the chemist's-" he broke off with amazement.

Lance took Kyra's hand and drew it over his arm.

"No, no!" he said, with a grave smile, with his eyes all aglow. "Not Miss Jermyn. This lady is my wife, Bertie, Mrs. le Breton!"

Leaving Lance to tell Bertie as much as Lance chose of his strange marriage, Kyra stole out of the room and went to Bessie. Bessie had recovered consciousness, and, though weak and shaken, was anxious to see Kyra and return home. As Kyra put her arms round her, Bessie faltered:

"Is he gone?"

"Yes, forever, dear," whispered Kyra, who knew Stracey was meant.

Bessie drew a long breath-one of relief.

"And-and the other-the gentleman who came to the Lane? It was to meet him that I asked you to come. Can you forgive me? I meant well—”

"I know," said Kyra. "There is nothing to forgive, Bes