y on the inside,
will open the door."

In the night Kate Gardiner had strange dreams of the locked cabin. Twenty
times in her sleep she was on the point of finding out the secret, but
always woke before she had made it her own. She was up early in the
morning, and went out, saying, as if carelessly, to Celestine, that she
must buy a few last things which she had forgotten. In the town she met
Loria, as they had arranged over-night, and he put into her hand
something in a sealed envelope.

"You are sure this will do it?" she asked.

"Sure," returned the Italian.

Then they parted; Kate took a small boat and was rowed out to the _Bella
Cuba_, which lay anchored not far from shore.

"I have come on board to look for a diamond ring which I think I dropped
in my cabin yesterday," she remarked to the captain.

He turned away, all unsuspicious and Kate hurried to the saloon off which
the cabins opened. Already she had broken the seal on the envelope, and
taken out a small, peculiarly shaped steel implement. With a quick glance
over her shoulder and a loud beating of the heart, she thrust the
master-key into the lock of the closed door.

CHAPTER V

THE LADY ON THE VERANDAH

No one was coming; Lady Gardiner dared to turn the key. The door opened,
and she looked into the room beyond.

It was a cabin, of the same size as the others, and fitted up as a
stateroom, but furnished and decorated differently. The five which Kate
had been shown yesterday were comfortable, but not particularly
luxurious, and she had wondered, since this was ostensibly a pleasure
trip, that beauty-loving Virginia had not thought it worth while to have
her own cabin, at least, made more dainty.

In the locked stateroom, whose secret Kate was violating, the berth was
hung with old brocaded silk of blue and silver, the curtains edged with
curious thick lace, yellowed by time. On the floor lay a beautiful
tiger-skin, covering it from end to end. A large fitted travelling-bag
stood open on a cushioned seat, showing silver-topped bottles; and the
wall on one side of the cabin was almost hidden with photographs and
sketches which had been tacked up, over a low book-shelf, filled with
volumes in uniform binding of blue and gold. The photographs were of
places as well as people, and Kate had just identified the Valley of the
Shadow, dominated by the Chateau de la Roche, when a sudden sound sent
her out of the cabin and into the saloon, with her