emphatic assurance that I would shield her against all comers, another loud summons was heard at the door.  A minute afterwards, a servant entered, and announced that Mr. Harlowe waited for me below.  I directed he should be shown into the library; and after iterating my assurance to Edith that she was quite safe from violence beneath my roof, and that I would presently return to hear her explanation of the affair, I went down stairs.

Mr. Harlowe, as I entered, was pacing rapidly up and down the apartment.  He turned to face me; and I thought he looked even more perturbed and anxious than vengeful and angry.  He, however, as I coldly bowed, and demanded his business with me, instantly assumed a bullying air and tone.

“Mrs. Harlowe is here:  she has surreptitiously left South Audley Street in a hired cab, and I have traced her to this house.”

“Well?”

“Well!  I trust it is well; and I insist that she instantly return to her home.”

“Her home!”

I used the word with an expression significative only of my sense of the sort of “home” he had provided for the gentle girl he had sworn to love and cherish; but the random shaft found a joint in his armor at which it was not aimed.  He visibly trembled, and turned pale.

“She has had time to tell you all then!  But be assured, sir, that nothing she has heard or been told, however true it may be—­may be, remember, I say—­can be legally substantiated except by myself.”

What could the man mean?  I was fairly puzzled:  but, professionally accustomed to conceal emotions of surprise and bewilderment, I coldly replied—­“I have left the lady who has sought the protection of her true ‘home,’ merely to ascertain the reason of this visit.”

“The reason of my visit!” he exclaimed with renewed fury:  “to reconvey her to South Audley Street.  What else?  If you refuse to give her up, I shall apply to the police.”

I smiled, and approached the bell.

“You will not surrender her then?”

“To judicial process only:  of that be assured.  I have little doubt that, when I am placed in full possession of all the facts of the case, I shall be quite able to justify my conduct.”  He did not reply, and I continued:  “If you choose to wait here till I have heard Edith’s statement, I will at once frankly acquaint you with my final determination.”

“Be it so:  and please to recollect, sir, that you have to deal with a man not easily baffled or entrapped by legal subtlety or cunning.”

I reascended to the drawing-room; and finding Edith—­thanks to the ministrations, medicinal and oral, of my bustling and indignant lady—­much calmer, and thoroughly satisfied that nobody could or should wrest her from us, begged her to relate unreservedly the cause or causes which had led to her present position.  She falteringly complied; and I listened with throbbing pulse and burning cheeks to the sad story of her wedded