Page:Robert Barr - Lord Stranleigh Philanthropist.djvu/26

 "My dear Stranleigh," said Mackeller, speaking with some difficulty, "Fate seems determined to place me under obligations to you that I can never repay."

"That's all right, Peter! Let us leave it with Fate. Now, will you be ready to depart with me for Nauheim to-morrow morning?"

"Oh, that is another thing I wish to speak to you about!" said Mackeller. "I cannot accept such a sacrifice on your part. You would be bored to death at a health resort filled with invalids. You must not accompany me to Nauheim."

"Friend Peter, I ask you to allow me to be a little selfish on occasion. I am going to Nauheim to prove whether or not it will cure me."

"Cure you! Why, there's nothing wrong with your heart, is there?"

"We read that the heart is deceitful, and desperately wicked, and that's what's the matter with mine. I learned its state, not from a doctor, but through introspection. An incident that occurred last week startled me. I engineered a deal against a man who asserted at the Camperdown Club that all the coups for which I had received credit were the result of luck and not of brains. I used to believe myself that it was luck, but I wasn't going to permit