I will tell you--I must tell you."

Asterisks, so dear to the heart of the lady novelist, will best represent
the confession that followed; words are not equal to the task.

* * * * *

Augusta listened with rising hair, and realised how very trying must be
the life of a private confessor.

"Oh, please stop!" she said faintly, at last. "I can't bear it--I
can't, indeed."

"Ah!" he said, as he sunk back exhausted. "I thought that when you
understood the customs at Meeson's you would feel for me in my present
position. Think, girl, think what I must suffer, with such a past,
standing face to face with an unknown future!"

Then came a silence.

"Take him away! Take him away!" suddenly shouted out Mr. Meeson, staring
around him with frightened eyes.

"Who?" asked Augusta; "who?"

"Him--the tall, thin man, with the big book! I know him; he used to be
Number 25--he died years ago. He was a very clever doctor; but one of his
patients brought a false charge against him and ruined him, so he had to
take to writing, poor devil! We made him edit a medical
encyclopaedia--twelve volumes for £300, to be paid on completion; and he