* * *

Months had gone by--months of constant travel and loneliness, grief and
despair.

I was in my room at the Hotel Bonne Femme in Turin, having a wash after
a dusty run with the "forty," when the waiter announced Mr. Bianchi, and
the sharp-featured, black-haired little man, recently promoted from
Florence to watch the Anarchists in Milan.

"I am very glad, Signor Ewart, that I have been able to catch you here;
you are such a bird of passage, you know," he said in Italian. "But in
searching the house of a thief in Florence the other day our men found
this letter, addressed to you;" and he produced from his pocket the
missive that Charlie had on that hot night entrusted to my care.

I broke the black seal and read it eagerly. Its contents held me
speechless in amazement.

"Do you know anything of a young man named Giovanni Murri, a
Florentine?" I inquired quickly.

"Murri?" he repeated, knitting his brows. "Why, if I remember aright,
a young man of that name was found drowned in the Arno on the same day
that your friend the Signor Whitaker was discovered dead. He had been
a waiter in London, it was said."

"That was the man. He killed my poor friend, and then committed
suicide;" and I briefly explained how Whitaker had given me the letter
which two hours afterwards had been stolen from me.

"The thief was the son of Count di Ferraris' gardener--a bad character.
Finding that it was addressed to you, he evidently intended to return it
unopened, and forgot to do so," Bianchi said. "But may I not read the
letter?"

"No," I replied firmly. "It concerns a purely private affair. All that I
can tell you is that Murri killed my friend. It explains the mystery."

Three nights later, I stood with my well-beloved in the elegant
drawing-room of a house just off Park Lane, where she was living with
her aunt.

I had placed the dead man's letter in her hand, and she was reading it
breathlessly, her sweet face blanched, her tiny hands trembling.

"Mr. Ewart," she faltered hoarsely, her eyes downcast as she stood
before me, "it is the truth. I ought to have told you long ago. Forgive
me."

"I have already forgiven you. You must have suffered just as bitterly as
I have done," I said, taking her hand.

"Ah yes. God alone knows the wretched life I have led, loving you and
yet not daring to tell you my secret. As Charlie has written here, the
young Italian, my father's valet, fell in love with me when I came