though
two were hidden by the dividing partitions, Steele saw the one figure
he sought at the head of the table. The figure bent forward in
conversation, and, while his voice was low and his words inaudible,
the Kentuckian saw that the eyes were glittering with a hard, almost
malevolent keenness. As he came hastily forward, he caught the voice:
it was Saxon's voice, yet infinitely harder. The two companions were
strangers of foreign aspect, and they were listening attentively,
though one face wore a sullen scowl.

Steele came over, and dropped his hand on the shoulder of the man he
had pursued.

"Bob!" he exclaimed, then halted.

The three faces looked up simultaneously, and in all was displeasure
for the abrupt interruption of a conversation evidently intended for
no outside ears. Each expression was blank and devoid of recognition,
and, as the tall man rose to his feet, his face was blanker than the
others.

Then, with the greater leisure for scrutiny, Steele realized his
mistake. For a time, he stood dumfounded at the marvelous resemblance.
He knew without asking that this man was the double who had brought
such a tangle into his friend's life. He bowed coldly.

"I apologize," he explained, shortly. "I mistook this gentleman for
someone else."

The three men inclined their heads stiffly, and the Kentuckian,
dejected by his sudden reverse from apparent success to failure,
turned on his heel, and left the place. It had not, of course,
occurred to him to connect the appearance of his snarler of Saxon's
affairs with the name on the Paris hotel-list, and he was left more
baffled than if he had known only the truth, in that he had been
thrown upon a false trail.

The Kentuckian joined Mrs. Horton and her niece in Genoa on their
arrival. As he met the hunger in the girl's questioning eyes, his
heart sickened at the meagerness of his news. He could only say that
Paris had divulged nothing, and that a trip to London had been equally
fruitless of result. He did not mention the fact that Saxon had
registered at the hotel. That detail he wished to spare her.

She listened to his report, and at its end said only, "Thank you," but
he knew that something must be done. A woman who could let herself be
storm-tossed by grief might ride safely out of such an affair when the
tempest had beaten itself out, but she, who merely smiled more sadly,
would not have even the relief that comes of surrender to tears.

At Milan, ther