“Carriage, sir,” said the footman, sharply, and they both drew back into the hall ready for the brougham which was driven up, and from which two ladies descended.
Chapter Fourteen.
Face to Face Again.
“That’s the house,” said Chester to himself; “I can swear to it. Highcombe Street, Number 44.”
He laughed in his excitement—an unpleasant, harsh laugh which startled him; for as a doctor he had had to deal with strange patients beside the one at the mysterious house, and he knew pretty well how a man acted who had been overwrought and whose nerves were in that state which borders upon insanity.
“This will not do,” he muttered. “I must be careful,” and, trying to pull himself together and make his plans in a matter-of-fact way, his startled feeling grew into a sensation of alarm, and he awakened fully now to the fact that the strain from which he had suffered had been too great.
“I must pull up short,” he said to himself. “This last month I have been acting like a madman. Well, love—the real passion—is a kind of madness, and I could not have acted otherwise with the horror of the position in which I left her upon my mind.”
As he walked home, though, he grew cooler, and made up his mind to watch the house until he obtained an interview with Marion.