“Whether I do or not depends upon you, Mr. Ferguson,” said Paul, very quietly. “It’s not curiosity that’s driving me, but I have my life in front of me, and a plan for it.”

He rose and stood at the open window for a moment or two, and then turned abruptly back and stood before Mr. Ferguson.

“You see, I was nine years old when I was with my father in London, old enough to notice, and old enough to remember. And one or two very curious things happened. We were in lodgings in a little quiet street, and except on occasions when, I suppose, he had appointments with you, my father never went out by daylight.”

“Here it comes,” thought Mr. Ferguson, but his face was quite without expression, and the youth resumed:

“But as soon as darkness fell we took long tramps through the city, where the streets were empty of everything but the lamp-posts, and the only sounds were the hollow sounds of our own footsteps upon the pavement.”

“Yes,” Mr. Ferguson interrupted. “One couldn’t choose a better place for exercise than the city of London after dark.”

Paul laughed pleasantly and Mr. Ferguson reflected, “I have never been called a liar in a prettier fashion.”

“On one of these nightly rambles,” Paul resumed, “we turned into a street closed at one end by a stately building of pinnacles and a sloping roof, and windows of richly stained glass. This building was a blaze of light, and in the courtyard in front of it motor-cars and carriages were taking up ladies in bright evening frocks and coats and men with orders upon their breasts.”

Mr. Ferguson nodded his head.

“A dinner at the Guildhall, yes.”

“It was curious to come suddenly out of darkness and silence and emptiness,” Paul Ravenel resumed, “into this gay scene of colour and enjoyment and light. You can imagine how it impressed a child. This was what I wanted. I hated long, empty, echoing streets with chains of lamps stretching ahead. Here I heard to me a sound unknown and divine—I heard women laughing. ‘Oh, father, do let us stay for a moment and look!’ I cried, but my father gripped me by the arm, and strode across the road so swiftly that I had to run to keep up with him. There was the mouth of another street nearly opposite, and it was that street which my father wanted to reach.”

“Yes?” said Mr. 

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