, too, at her
father's invitation. But he broke in upon my thanks.

"Not another word, Mr. Anstruther," he said; "it is you who confer the
benefit upon me.

"Now, you say you have a message from the poor old Baroness d'Altenberg
for me. Good! I will show you to my study, and there we will go into
the matter at our leisure."

He led me down a long corridor to a beautiful room overlooking the
valley, communicating with a long range of what looked like
conservatories. Hardly necessary, I thought, in such a climate!

"Now," said my host, placing a box of cigars before me, "amuse yourself
with these, and my servant shall bring us some champagne to celebrate
your arrival. I will just go and see my sister and little Dolores
settled in their apartments, then I will come back to you and we can
have our talk. You shall tell me all about the poor Baroness."

The kind old man pressed me down into a comfortable lounge chair, then
with a smile departed.

I took a good look round the room, and took stock of its contents. It
was furnished very luxuriously in the European fashion and contained
some beautiful pictures, but its principal ornaments were cases of
stuffed reptiles of every sort, from a tiny lizard to a great
boa-constrictor with red jaws agape.

There were four French windows opening to the ground, shaded by outside
striped blinds similar to those used in England, but not low enough to
hide a most splendid view of hill and dale and far-away mountains,
which seemed to surround the city of Valoro, itself seeming to rest on
a plateau.

I was standing looking at a case of particularly objectionable yellow
snakes when I heard one of the French windows move behind me; turning,
I came face to face with the polite lieutenant of the band of robbers
who had attacked our train. He had discarded the cowboys' dress and
wore the clothes of a gentleman. He at once raised a revolver to the
level of my head as I started back, and addressed me in perfectly
polite tones.

"Come, come, Mr. Anstruther," he said, "it's no good. I want that
packet. If you don't give it to me I shall simply shoot you through
the head and take it."

It appeared to me that my journey after all had been in vain; there was
the muzzle of the pistol within six inches of my head, and I had to
make up my mind about it.

St. Nivel's words came back to me concerning the ill-luck of it, and I
could almost hear him saying--

"Let the thing go; it is