the furtive
mode in which that man had escaped him. It was, however, by that very
flight Trevor confirmed the suspicion he had attached to him, and so
the stranger continued to show that from the hour of his escape they
had never "lost the track." How they had crossed the Atlantic he next
recorded,--all their days spent in discussing the one theme; no other
incident or event ever occupying a moment's attention. "We were certain
of two things," said he: "there was a deep snare, and that girl was its
victim." He confessed that if to himself the inquiry possessed a deep
interest, with old Layton it had become a passion.

"At last," continued Trover, "he began to confess that their hopes fell,
and each day's discomfiture served to chill the ardor that had sustained
them, when a strange and most unlooked-for light broke in upon them
by the discovery of a few lines of a note written by you to Dr. Layton
himself years before, and, being produced, was at once recognized as the
handwriting of Mrs. Penthony Morris."

"Written by _me!_ How could I have written to him? I never heard of
him," broke she in.

"Yes, he was the doctor who attended Hawke in his last illness, and it
appeared you wrote to beg he would cut off a lock of hair for you, and
bring it to you."

"I remember that," said she, in a hollow voice, "though I never
remembered his name was Layton. And he has this note still?"

"You shall hear. No sooner had his son--"

"You cannot mean Alfred Layton?"

"Yes; the same. No sooner had he declared that he knew the hand, than
they immediately traced you in Mrs. Penthony Morris, and knowing that
Stocmar had become the girl's guardian, they lost no time in finding
him out. I was too much flurried and terrified at this moment to collect
clearly what followed, but I gathered that the elder Layton held over
him some threat which, if pushed to execution, might ruin him. By means
of this menace, they made Stocmar confess everything. He told who Clara
was, how he had gained possession of her, under what name she went, and
where she was then living. Through some influence which I cannot trace,
they interested a secretary of state in their case, and started for
the Continent with strong letters from the English authorities, and
a detective officer specially engaged to communicate with the foreign
officials, and permit, when the proofs might justify, of an arrest."

"How much do they know, then?" asked she, calmly.

"They kn