ught me a
message from some of the many ladies we have met in our travels. I
suppose I had better see him if he comes again."

"I suppose so," Captain Bayley said. "He is not likely to eat you, and
as my room opens off the sitting-room, you have only to scream and I can
come in to your rescue."

"Very well, I will scream, uncle, if necessary. But do you think he
wants to see me alone?"

"As he has only asked for you, and no one else, I suppose he does. At
any rate I have no lively curiosity as to his visit, and I don't suppose
Harry has either. Most likely it's some man who wants to sell you
jewellery or cameos, or to ask you for a subscription for the chaplain,
or to beg of you on some pretext or other; they are always at it. He saw
your name on the hotel list standing without any male protector of the
same name. No doubt he thinks you are an elderly spinster with money."

"I expect it's something of that sort, Alice," Harry laughed.

But Alice insisted that she was convinced that the mysterious stranger
had something important to communicate to her. As she was taking her
things off there was a knock at the door, and the waiter said--

"The gentleman who before called is below."

"Show him up into our sitting-room," she said, and at once went in to
receive him. "He's just coming up, uncle," she said, tapping at Captain
Bayley's door. He opened it a few inches.

"I have got my pistol handy, Alice, in case you scream."

Alice laughed, and as she turned round there was a knock at the door.
The waiter announced Monsieur Adams, and an elderly gentleman entered.

"You must be surprised at the intrusion of a stranger at this hour of
the evening, Miss Hardy; but my excuse must be that I have for nearly
two months been following your footsteps, and I was afraid that if I put
off calling upon you until the morning I might find that you had gone."

"Following me for two months!" Alice repeated, in great surprise. "I do
not understand, sir."

"Naturally, Miss Hardy, the statement appears a strange one to you; but
the fact is I made a promise to deliver a message to you. I found upon
reaching England that you had left; I obtained your address at Cairo,
and went there only to find you had left a fortnight before my arrival;
then I followed you to Naples, and was a week too late. At Rome I missed
you by a day, and as I could not learn there, at your hotel, where you
were going next, beyond the fact that you had gone Nort