stood over her while she packed them into a common cardboard box and
addressed them to the Princess in Rome. At first she demurred about
her handwriting, but I insisted. I intended her to take the risk--just
as I had taken a risk.

And, further, I compelled her to order her car, and we drove to the
General Post Office in Naples, where I saw that she registered the
valuable packet.

The anonymous return of the pearls was a nine days' wonder throughout
Italy; but the Marchesa never knew how I had obtained my information,
and never dreamed that I had come to her upon a mission of inquiry
from the one person in all the world whom she feared, the man in whose
clutches she had been for years--the mysterious "Golden Face."

When, with Lola and Madame, I returned home a week later and explained
the whole of my adventures, Rayne sat for a few moments silent. Then,
as I looked, I saw vengeance written upon his face.

"I suspected that she was playing me false, and selling stuff in
secret through that fellow Zuccari! She is carrying on the business by
herself. I now have proof of it--and I shall take my own steps! You
will see!"

He did--and a month later the Marchesa Romanelli was arrested and sent
to prison for the theft of a pair of diamond earrings belonging to a
fellow-guest staying at one of the great palaces of Florence.

It was a scandal that Italy is not likely to easily forget.

CHAPTER XIII

ABDUL HAMID'S JEWELS

Rudolph Rayne, though the ruler of aristocratic Crookdom, was
sometimes most sympathetic and generous towards lovers.

The following well illustrates his strange abnormal personality and
complex nature:

One night I chanced to enter his bedroom at Half Moon Street, when I
found him looking critically through a quantity of the most
magnificent sparkling gems my eyes had ever seen. Some were set as
pendants, brooches, and earrings, while others--great rubies and
emeralds of immense value--were uncut.

As I entered he put his hands over them in distinct annoyance. Then, a
few seconds later, removed them, saying with a queer laugh:

"A nice little lot this, eh? One of the very finest collections I've
seen."

On the table lay a pair of jewelers' tweezers and a magnifying glass,
therefore it was apparent that, as a connoisseur of gems, he had been
estimating their value.

"By Jove!" I exclaimed. "They certainly are magnificent! Whose are
they?"

"They once belonged to the dead Sultan Abd