coming on, Mr. Tillotson had been brought
to the Royal Albion, where the good-natured
landlady was looking out wistfully, and wondering
what had kept him. It was the best
room in her house, and she was hovering outside
the door, good and unsuspicious soul as
she was, to hear what a great local doctor, who
had been hurriedly sent for, would decide. It
was a pity, she thought, that he had no woman's
gentle hand to look after him and smoothe his
pillow, and only that good-natured lame old
gentleman.

It had been better, certainly; for the captain,
best and most willing of men, could not supply
a wife's place; and that wife, Mrs. Tillotson,
hurt by ungenerous suspicions, and not knowing
that her husband was suffering from anything
but a morbid, unjust, and unreasonable
fit of suspicion, had gone back straight to London;
while that husband, crushed, overwhelmed,
had given way to what the excitement of that
long, long night had helped him to fight off.
The dreadful wounds of all that night had begun
to fester; the cruel stabbings he had borne so
many hours — all made themselves felt now. He
was at last prostrated; and the grand local
doctor, Gabbett Watson, Physician to the Royal
Dock Hospital, whispered to the captain, "On
the lungs, sir. Serious."

It was indeed serious. And yet hopeless,
miserable, and abandoned as he was, he would
not yet quite "give in." His one wish and
prayer was to be "taken home." He had
strength for that, he said. The captain had
many councils with the good landlady on this
point, who repeatedly asked him, "Where was
his mother or wife, that she didn't come and
nurse him, and London so near?" questions
that put the good-natured invention of the
captain to all sorts of straits.

"You see," he said, "she's very delicate herself;
and, egad! she likes him only too well,
ma'am; and, faith, we're trying to keep it from
her. You see, ma'am!"

Towards the evening of a lovely sunny day,
when not a breath was stirring, and the stabbing
east winds had hurried off to visit other
regions, Mr. Tillotson, looking, as the captain
said, "like a ghost," worn and aged with suffering
of mind and body, came down to the sitting-room
to the astonished captain.

"Do you want to get your death, Tillotson?
This is going beyond the beyonds. Go up
again, my dear fellow. Go, now."

But Mr. Tillotson said in a whisper, "It
is of no use. I cannot rest here. I must
go home. Let me go, either to live or die.
I cannot get well here. She has abandoned
me. But still I am innocent; and before she
goes I want to tell her so, and humble myself.
I have done her cruel wrong. If I wait another
hour, I shall not have strength. I pant to get
to my own home again; and I feel this—this
thing is growing fast upon me."He put his
hand upon his chest, where were the steel bars,
now tightened every moment.

The captain said many a "What folly, now,
my dear fellow!" and implored him to "get
back to his warm bed" again. But without
effect. At last it occurred to him it might
be wiser after all to let him have his way.
An opinion he was fortified in, when he noticed
some faint light coming into Mr. Tillotson's
dull eyes, and the very faintest tinge of
colour into his cheeks.

The train started at three; and the crowd
going to town by that evening train were
struck by the shrunken and sickly figure that
came on the platform. Yet there was still
brightness in the eyes. The prospect of action
had given him strength. It was a wonderful
victory of spirit over the flesh. In the train,
and hardly able to hold up his head, he said
to the captain, faintly, "If I can manage only
four hours! After that, I don't care." With
his usual forethought, the captain had secured
a compartment for themselves, and had even
taken the precaution of getting a doctor (not,
of course, of the great local standing of Gabbett
Watson) to accompany them in the train privately
for a few miles.

But as the train swept on  — it was a very
speedy express — the captain's watchful eye
saw that his companion was growing worse.
At the very first station, when they had
been about three-quarters of an hour on the
road, and when the doctor came to the carriage,
like a common passenger, the captain
bade him get in. The doctor was a little
alarmed at the change. The light was fading
out of Mr. Tillotson's eyes; the excitement
was fast waning; the energy that had borne
him through so much was weary. The iron
bands were tightening: he could not speak
— indeed seemed scarcely conscious.

The local doctor put a little bottle to Mr.
Tillotson's lips. "We must do all we can to
keep him up, just for three-quarters more.
Then we shall be at a large town, where we can
stop and have good accommodation. If he
goes a mile further after that, I wouldn't answer
for it."

Utterly overwhelmed, the captain could only
murmur, " And this place—where is it?"

"A large cathedral town — St. Alans. There's
a good inn there — the White Hart — where they
will take care of him. Ah! see, he's better
now."

Were not these names two secret talismans,
to call back the waning strength of Mr. Tillotson?
"St. Alans," he said, eagerly; "where!
— who is going to St. Alans!"

"That's right, sir," said the doctor, gladly.
"We shall be there in half an hour. We are
going to stop there for the night, at the White
Hart, if you have no objection."

"Going to St. Alans?" said Mr. Tillotson,
lighting up. "Yes, let us stop there. The very
place! Take me there!"

"We will, Tillotson," said the captain.

"Going back to St. Alans," repeated Mr.
Tillotson, wearily looking from one window, as
if to make it out. "It seems as if it were
ordered so. It is the spot I would have chosen.
This is good news, indeed. Much better than
going on to town, I am sure, my dear captain,"