Chapter 2 - Page 2

In each such
glimpse, the face seemed to grow more childish and more innocent:
and, when I had at last thought the veil entirely away, it was,
unmistakeably, the sweet face of little Sylvie!

"So, either I've been dreaming about Sylvie," I said to myself,
"and this is the reality. Or else I've really been with Sylvie,
and this is a dream! Is Life itself a dream, I wonder?"

To occupy the time, I got out the letter, which had caused me to take
this sudden railway-journey from my London home down to a strange
fishing-town on the North coast, and read it over again:-

"DEAR OLD FRIEND,

"I'm sure it will be as great a pleasure to me, as it can possibly
be to you, to meet once more after so many years: and of course I
shall be ready to give you all the benefit of such medical skill as
I have: only, you know, one mustn't violate professional etiquette!
And you are already in the hands of a first-rate London doctor,
with whom it would be utter affectation for me to pretend to compete.

(I make no doubt he is right in saying the heart is affected: all your
symptoms point that way.)

One thing, at any rate, I have already done in my doctorial
capacity--secured you a bedroom on the ground-floor, so that
you will not need to ascend the stairs at all.

"I shalt expect you by last train on Friday, in accordance with your
letter: and, till then, I shalt say, in the words of the old song,
'Oh for Friday nicht! Friday's lang a-coming!'

"Yours always,

"ARTHUR FORESTER.

"P.S. Do you believe in Fate?"

This Postscript puzzled me sorely. "He is far too sensible a man,"
I thought, "to have become a Fatalist. And yet what else can he mean by
it?" And, as I folded up the letter and put it away, I inadvertently
repeated the words aloud. "Do you believe in Fate?"

The fair 'Incognita' turned her head quickly at the sudden question.
"No, I don't!" she said with a smile. "Do you?"

"I--I didn't mean to ask the question!" I stammered, a little taken
aback at having begun a conversation in so unconventional a fashion.

The lady's smile became a laugh--not a mocking laugh, but the laugh
of a happy child who is perfectly at her ease. "Didn't you?" she said.
"Then it was a case of what you Doctors call 'unconscious cerebration'?"

"I am no Doctor," I replied. "Do I look so like one? Or what makes you
think it?"

She pointed to the book I had been reading, which was so lying that its
title, "Diseases of the Heart," was plainly visible.

"One needn't be a Doctor," I said, "to