into some one and fell.  Besmeared and bespattered, he quickly picked himself up; and when, a moment later, he gained the sidewalk, no one would hardly have recognized in the dilapidated-looking creature the dapper Hugh Ridgeway.  Police whistles were calling behind him, nearer and nearer, but he walked boldly out into the street and up to Sixth Avenue.  His nerves were tingling and his breathing was hard to control after the mad dash through the alley, but he slouched along in the lee of the buildings to escape the downpour, stopping near the corner.

Suddenly he rushed out and hailed a passing cab, climbed inside and gave orders to drive as quickly as possible to the Twenty-third Street Ferry.  Then he sat up boldly and stared forth with all the courage that his escape inspired.

“By Jove,” he was shouting inwardly, “that poor devil was on my heels.  He looked hard as he hustled past, but I stared back just as hard.  It took nerve to face him.  Hang it all, I’m sorry for him.  He wasn’t to blame.  But this letter will cheer him up.  It’s for the kids if anything happens to him.”

Apparently changing his mind at Herald Square, he instructed the driver to go down Thirty-fifth Street to Eighth Avenue and drop him at the corner.  After leaving the cab he ventured into an all-night shop and bought a cheap raincoat, slouch hat and umbrella.  Then, like a thief, he stole forth and warily made his way toward the dock.  It was bad going and he hailed a second cab.  Before climbing into it, he crossed and dropped an envelope into the mailbox.

“There,” he muttered, “that helps my conscience.  By Jove, this has been a corking start for the adventure.  Talk about dime novels!”

He instructed the driver to take him to a point not far from the dock, a precaution which suddenly invested itself.  It would be wise to approach the liner by stealth, taking no chances.  They were sailing by one of the obscure lines, not for economy’s sake, but to avoid possible contact with friends of their own class.

As he rattled off through the night, huddled back in the blackness of the cab, Hugh began to have the first pangs of uneasiness.  The distressing fear that all had not gone well with Grace flooded his brain with misgivings and feverish doubts.  A clock in a shop window told him it was nearly ten o’clock.  He was cursing himself for permitting her to rush off alone in a night like this, into a quarter that reeked with uncertainty and disorder.  Vague horrors presented themselves to his distressed mind; calamity stared at him from the mouth of every dark alley; outrage, crime, misfortune, danced in every shadow.  As for himself, he was a sorry sight and enough to frighten Grace into convulsions at one glance.  Rain-soaked, muddy, bedraggled, it was not the debonnaire Chicagoan of old who skulked away from the cab at a certain black corner and made his way stealthily, even fearfully, toward the distant dock.