ld
himself as the price of his secret, to the effect that he should
renounce everything, leave England, and become known at Scotland Yard as
a criminal fugitive.  He was to part from Claudia, whom he loved, and
who loved him with all her soul; to leave her without farewell and
without any words breathing patience and courage.  And this, after his
solemn declarations of an hour before!

What would she think of him--she who had been just as much a part of his
life as he of hers?

In those brief moments he remembered the wild, uncurbed passion of her
love; how that she had exalted him as her idol, as the one person who
held her future in his hands, the one person whose kiss gave life to
her.  She was wealthy, almost beyond the wildest dreams of her youth;
but riches availed her not.  Her heart was bursting with the great and
boundless love she bore him.  He knew this; knew it all, and sighed as
he faced the inevitable.

What an ignominious ending to a brief and brilliant career!  It had been
a thousand times better if he had cast the offer of the temptress aside,
and swallowed the fatal draught he had prepared!  The jury would have
pronounced him to be the victim of temporary insanity, and all the ugly
story that was now in possession of Scotland Yard would have been hushed
for ever, and the high honour of the Chisholms saved from public
blemish.

Bah!  He had been weak, he told himself, and for his lack of courage he
must now suffer.  His thoughts turned again to suicide, but on
reflection he saw that to take his own life was now unavailing.  The
truth was known at the Home Office, and the police would reveal it at
the inquiry into the cause of his decease.

He was helpless, utterly helpless, in the hands of a clever adventuress.

Long and steadily he looked at the Italian.  This man with the thin,
haggard face, grey moustache and deeply furrowed brow, was actually the
most daring and ingenious of all the confidential agents employed by the
British Intelligence Department on the Continent.  Known to the
Department 