of the game. What was the matter with the bank? The manager?"

His voice was almost monotonous in its quietness. It was as though he
told the story of something which had passed beyond chance or change.
As it unfolded to her understanding, she had seated herself near to his
bed. The door of the room was open, and in view outside on the landing
sat Madame Bulteel reading. She was not, however, near enough to hear
the conversation.

Ingolby's voice was low, but it sounded as loud as a waterfall in the
ears of the girl, who, in a few weeks, had travelled great distances on
the road called Experience, that other name for life.

"It was the manager?" he repeated.

"Yes, they say so," she answered. "He speculated with bank money."

"In what?"

"In your railways," she answered hesitatingly. "Curious--I dreamed
that," Ingolby remarked quietly, and leaned down and stroked the dog
lying at his feet. It had been with him through all his sickness.
"It must have been part of my delirium, because, now that I've got my
senses back, it's as though someone had told me about it. Speculated in
my railways, eh? Chickens come home to roost, don't they? I suppose I
ought to be excited over it all," he continued. "I suppose I ought. But
the fact is, you only have just the one long, big moment of excitement
when great trouble and tragedy come, or else it's all excitement, all the
time, and then you go mad. That's the test, I think. When you're struck
by Fate, as a hideous war-machine might strike you, and the whole terror