nsiderable apprehension I must admit.

On entering his room at the Ministry, he gave me a cigarette, and
commenced to chat. Then suddenly he touched a bell, another door opened,
and I was amazed at seeing before me, between two grey-coated
police-officers, a woman--Julie Rosier!

For an instant she glared at me as though she saw an apparition. Then,
with a loud scream, she fainted.

"Ah!" exclaimed Zuroff. "Then what is reported is correct--eh? You and
your friend the Baron enticed this Englishman to your house in London,
for you knew by some means that he carried the order of the Minister
allowing the bearer free passage everywhere in Russia. You saw that if
you merely stole it he would give information, and it would be
immediately cancelled. Therefore you cleverly plotted to take his life
and make it appear as a case of suicide." Then, with a wave of his hand,
he said, "Take the prisoner back to the fortress."

The woman uttered no word. She only fixed her big dark eyes upon me with
an expression of abject terror, and then the guards led her out.

From a drawer Zuroff took the precious document that had been stolen
from me, saying--

"Julie Rosier--or Sophie Markovitch, as her real name is--was arrested
in a house in the Nevski yesterday, while the Baron was discovered at
the Hotel d'Angleterre. Both are most violent revolutionists, and to
them is due the terrible rioting in Moscow a few months ago. The Baron
was hand in hand with Gapon and his colleagues, but escaped to England,
and has been there for nearly a year, until, as the outcome of the
dastardly plot against you, he altered his appearance, and returned as
George Ewart, chauffeur to Baron Bindo di Ferraris of Rome. The arrests
yesterday were very smartly made."

"But how do you know the details of the attempt upon me?"

"All men can be bought at a price. They were watched constantly while in
London. Besides, one of your fellow-guests of that night--revolutionists
all of them--recently turned police spy and reported the facts. It was
he who gave us information regarding the whereabouts of Sophie and the
Baron."

"But another man--a young fellow with fair hair--ate some of the plums
from the snap-dragon and died."

"Yes; he was young Ivan Kinski--a Pole, who, though a Terrorist, was
suspected by his friends of being a spy. You took one plum only, while
he probably took more. At any rate, you had a very narrow escape. But
you at least have the satisf