A MATRIMONIAL TALE Before Geoffrey Bingham dropped off into a troubled sleep on that eventful night of storm, he learned that the girl who had saved his life at the risk and almost at the cost of her own was out of danger, and in his own and more reticent way he thanked Providence as heartily as did Owen Davies.

Then he went to sleep.
When he woke, feeling very sick and so stiff and sore that he could scarcely move, the broad daylight was streaming through the blinds.

The place was perfectly quiet, for the doctor's assistant who had brought him back to life, and who lay upon a couch at the further end of the room, slept the sleep of youth and complete exhaustion.

Only an eight-day clock on the mantelpiece ticked in that solemn and aggressive way which clocks affect in the stillness.

Geoffrey strained his eyes to make out the time, and finally discovered that it wanted a few minutes to six o'clock.