_An Escape_ One night, in the following June, Priam and Alice refrained from going to bed.

Alice dozed for an hour or so on the sofa, and Priam read by her side in an easy-chair, and about two o'clock, just before the first beginnings of dawn, they stimulated themselves into a feverish activity beneath the parlour gas.

Alice prepared tea, bread-and-butter, and eggs, passing briskly from room to room.

Alice also ran upstairs, cast a few more things into a valise and a bag already partially packed, and, locking both receptacles, carried them downstairs.

Meantime the whole of Priam's energy was employed in having a bath and in shaving.