I may mention, incidentally, that I had resolved to act on Foster's advice before he offered it. Only, with a difference. I contemplated seeking a new environment, in a sense which he had not suggested. The Marquis of Twickenham was going on another little excursion, which might endure for another fifteen years, or perhaps for ever.

To be plain, the game was hardly good enough. I was unable, even after mature consideration, to explain to myself exactly what it was I proposed to gain by assuming brevet rank, with the attendant collaterals, but whatever it was I hadn't got it. That was a dead-sure thing. I hadn't even got the fun of the fair. The joke fell flat. About the business there wasn't even a flavour of adventure. No spice at all. I had walked into the house as through my own front door, and from the first moment no one had said me nay. The excitement wasn't worth a tinker's curse.

All I had gained was a blackguard's name and his unspeakable reputation, a property which no decent creature would approach while I was near, and a shipload of money for which, under existing circumstances, I had no use whatever. As it happens, my tastes are simple. I like plain food, well cooked, and sound whisky. Those things don't cost much. In the matter of personal adornment I'm not taking anything. I'm not a tailor's block, and as for jewellery, I never wore even a finger ring or a scarf pin--and never will. I've a respectful admiration for the gentleman who plasters his money on his person, but as a general rule I find that I prefer to look at him from the other side of the room. I like a horse, and I'd always have good cattle. But riding alone's no fun, and from driving with a groom for constant company, the Lord preserve us! I've a pretty straight eye along the barrel of a gun: but who wants to go shooting in one's own society? I've a taste for the sea, but a yacht with only the crew aboard is dull o'nights. There's no one round who's fonder of a gamble, but I do bar sitting down with a job lot of men all with their eyes skinned to notice when you first begin to cheat.

No; if I was to do these things I'd do them as the Marquis of Twickenham should, or not at all. I'd be courted: I'd not court. I'd not descend into the gutter to be hail-fellow-well-met with those to whom my rank and fortune were everything, and who'd be willing, to my face--I'd never dare to turn it away for fear of what they'd say behind my back--to excuse my character on their account. My peers or nothing; and they, at least, on equal ground. My Lord of Twickenham was a great man; if he wasn't, he was nothing. As for living things down, I hadn't the time to spare. I'd be dead before I was a hundred years older; and, anyhow, it wasn't good enough.

It got borne in on me more and more, as I continued to reside in that atmosphere of undignified dignity, that there was something that was good enough, and that was just across the road. Mary and the kids. I had only seen her that once, and I was starving for another sight. I wasn't surrounded by trusting friends; and slipping from Twickenham House to Little Olive Street and back again was a trick which might be played once too often. If it was, Mary would find me out. And then-- I'd be a Marquis of Twickenham to her. The Lord forbid!

I had thought of a better way. The Marquis of Twickenham had placed where he knew he'd always be able to find it a nice little sum of money. I don't want to overload this part with details, so I won't say just how much. It was enough. The interest would enable Mr. and Mrs. Merrett to live the rest of their lives in something more than comfort. Mary would think herself rich beyond the dreams of avarice. God bless the girl!

The Marquis of Twickenham would just go out one morning, and Mr. James Merrett would come home. This time for good. He'd announce that he had had enough of leaving wife and children, and that he had therefore resolved in future, wherever he went, to take them with him. I guessed that Mary would be pleased. So Little Olive Street would soon be a thing of the past, and presently a united family would be found in quite another quarter.

It was a pretty programme, and I was bent on carrying it out. Foster's notion of a new environment wasn't bad, but I was vain enough to think that mine was better. I was going to learn from the best of all teachers, experience, what being married to the woman you're in love with really means. I didn't unduly hurry, but I lost no time. I made all the arrangements I could think of; then I looked at them once or twice all round, to see that they were made. It seemed to me they were.

Then one evening his lordship stepped out of Twickenham House into St. James's Square, bent on taking another excursion of some length. I had said nothing to any one in the house. The servants did not even know that I was going out. My goings and comings had nothing to do with them. My notion was that I would send Foster, say, from Paris, a letter containing no address. In it I would inform him that I was about to act upon his hint, and seek a fresh environment. How long the search would continue I could not say. Therefore I should be obliged if he would see that during my absence certain arrangements, which I would name, were carried out, so that my affectionate brother might not think it necessary to have me buried by proxy a second time.

I was conscious as I left the house that it was a clear and pleasant evening, and that the sky was peopled with many stars. At the foot of the steps I paused and looked about me. It was not my intention to go straight to Little Olive Street, but to spend that night, and probably the following day, in transacting certain little business matters of my own. As I stood there, my feelings were those of the boy who quits, for ever, a hated school. A whimsical mood came over me. Wheeling round, I shook my fist at the door, which had just been closed.

'I hope I'll never come through you again. The Marquis slips his skin!'

Turning, I moved along the pavement. I hadn't gone a dozen yards when I came upon a man who advanced from the direction in which I was going. At sight, each, on the instant, recognised the other. We both stopped dead.

It was my double--the man with a tongue whom I had seem at M'Croskay's in San Francisco. His lordship's very own self. Simon Pure.

BOOK IV.--THE SINNER

THE AUTHOR THROWS LIGHT UPON AN
INTERESTING SITUATION