It was nothing to him that the smell of spring was in the air; that the lark was carolling high overhead; that the declining sun was darting his rays through the trees.
Near at hand rose a sound of laughter.

He durst not turn that way, lest he should meet his own children.
Far away, through a break in the trees, he could catch a glimpse of the old church at Yeld with the Vicarage beside it, where dwelt the one being he dreaded most--his own daughter.

From behind wafted a sound of music through an open window, where sat the man who had found him out and could ruin him by a word.
Which way was he to turn?
Which way shall a man turn who would escape from himself?
For two long hours he wandered on caring not which way he took, and feeling himself step by step closer beset by his dismal forebodings.
Presently he found himself beyond the park boundaries on the open downs which stretched to the edge of the cliff.

The touch of the salt sea- breeze on his fevered brow startled him and made him shiver.

The last gleam of daylight was fading in the west, and when presently it flickered out and left him in the dark, he felt that the last ray of his own hope had vanished too.