He knelt down, to steady himself, as nearly as possible on a level with the nurse's knees. By a hair's breadth at a time, he got both hands under the child. By a hair's breadth at a time, he drew the child away from her; leaving her hand resting on her lap by degrees so gradual that the lightest sleeper could not have felt the change. That done (barring accidents), all was done. Keeping the child resting easily on his left arm, he had his right hand free to shut the door again. Arrived at the garden steps, a slight change passed over the sleeping infant's face--the delicate little creature shivered as it felt the full flow of the open air. He softly laid over its face a corner of the woollen shawl in which it was wrapped. The child reposed as quietly on his arm as if it had still been on the nurse's lap.

In a minute more he was at the paling. The woman rose to receive him, with the first smile that had crossed her face since they had left London.

"So you've got the baby," she said, "Well, you are a deep one!"

"Take it," he answered irritably. "We haven't a moment to lose."

Only stopping to put on his shoes, he led the way towards the more central part of the town. The first person he met directed him to the railway station. It was close by. In five minutes more the woman and the baby were safe in the train to London.

"There's the other half of the money," he said, handing it to her through the carriage window.

The woman eyed the child in her arms with a frowning expression of doubt. "All very well as long as it lasts," she said. "And what after that?"

"Of course, I shall call and see you," he answered.

She looked hard at him, and expressed the whole value she set on that assurance in four words. "Of course you will!"

The train started for London. Farnaby watched it, as it left the platform, with a look of unfeigned relief. "There!" he thought to himself. "Emma's reputation is safe enough now! When we are married, we mustn't have a love-child in the way of our prospects in life."

Leaving the station, he stopped at the refreshment room, and drank a glass of brandy-and-water. "Something to screw me up," he thought, "for what is to come." What was to come (after he had got rid of the child) had been carefully considered by him, on the journey to Ramsgate. "Emma's husband-that-is-to-be"--he had reasoned it out--"will naturally be the first person Emma wants to see, when the loss of the baby has upset the house. If Old Ronald has a grain of affection left in him, he must let her marry me after that!"

Acting on this view of his position, he took the way that led back to Slains Row, and rang the door-bell as became a visitor who had no reasons for concealment now.

The household was doubtless already disorganized by the discovery of the child's disappearance. Neither master nor servant was active in answering the bell. Farnaby submitted to be kept waiting with perfect composure. There are occasions on which a handsome man is bound to put his personal advantages to their best use. He took out his pocket-comb, and touched up the arrangement of his whiskers with a skilled and gentle hand. Approaching footsteps made themselves heard along the passage at last. Farnaby put back his comb, and buttoned his coat briskly. "Now for it!" he said, as the door was opened at last.

THE STORY

BOOK THE FIRST

AMELIUS AMONG THE SOCIALISTS

CHAPTER 1

Sixteen years after the date of Mr. Ronald's disastrous discovery at Ramsgate--that is to say, in the year 1872--the steamship Aquila left the port of New York, bound for Liverpool.

It was the month of September.