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The search was given over at last in despair, and the doctor took his

hat and disappeared Sir Norman and Ormiston stopped in the lower hall

and looked at each other in mute a e than to his bewildered companion

"I haven't the faintest idea," said Sir Norman, distractedly; "only I a so desperate

that the plague will be a trifle compared to it!"

"It seems almost impossible that she can have been carried off--doesn't

it?"

"If she has!" exclaimed Sir Norman, "and I find out the abductor, he

won't have a whole bone in his body two one off herself," pursued

Or upon an abstruse subject, and

taking no heed whatever of his coinal notes

"Gone off herself! Is the man crazy?" inquired Sir Norman, with a stare

"Fifteen minutes before we left her dead, or in a dead swoon, which is

all the sa off

herself!"

"In fact, the only way to get at the bottoo in search of her Sleeping, I suppose, is out of the

question"

"Of course it is! I shall never sleep again till I find her!"

They passed out, and Sir Nor

the key, thereby fulfilling the adage of locking the stable-door when

the steed was stolen The night had grown darker and hotter; and as they

walked along, the clock of St Paul's tolled nine

"And nohere shall we go?" inquired Sir Norman, as they rapidly