With most of us the curtain falls very punctually, leaving time for a merry supper, where we forget the headache and the thousand natural and unnatural ills that passed in our sight before the green baize let fall its merciful veil.
Stafford pursued his way through the woods.

Arriving at the lodge gates, he stopped abruptly, remembering his promise to Eugene.

He saw a little fellow playing about, and called to him.
"Do you know Mr.Lane, my boy ?" he asked.
"Yes, sir," said the child.
"Then I'll give you something to take to him." He took a card out of his pocket and wrote on it: "You were right.

I am going to London"; and giving it, with a sixpence, to his messenger, resumed his journey to the station.
He was stunned.

It cannot be denied that he had been blindly hopeful, blindly confident.