' he said. 'And no wonder, after
that frightful discovery under the hearth-stone. We won't dispute about
it; we will wait a day or two until you are quite yourself again. In
the meantime, let us understand each other on one point at least. You
leave the question of what is to be done with these pages of writing to
me, as the head of the family?'

'I do.'

Lord Montbarry quietly took up the manuscript, and threw it into the
fire. 'Let this rubbish be of some use,' he said, holding the pages
down with the poker. 'The room is getting chilly--the Countess's play
will set some of these charred logs flaming again.' He waited a little
at the fire-place, and returned to his brother. 'Now, Henry, I have a
last word to say, and then I have done. I am ready to admit that you
have stumbled, by an unlucky chance, on the proof of a crime committed
in the old days of the palace, nobody knows how long ago. With that
one concession, I dispute everything else. Rather than agree in the
opinion you have formed, I won't believe anything that has happened.
The supernatural influences that some of us felt when we first slept in
this hotel--your loss of appetite, our sister's dreadful dreams, the
smell that overpowered Francis, and the head that appeared to Agnes--I
declare them all to be sheer delusions! I believe in nothing, nothing,
nothing!' He opened the door to go out, and looked back into the room.
'Yes,' he resumed, 'there is one thing I believe in. My wife has
committed a breach of confidence--I believe Agnes will marry you. Good
night, Henry. We leave Venice the first thing to-morrow morning.

So Lord Montbarry disposed of the mystery of The Haunted Hotel.

POSTSCRIPT

A last chance of deciding the difference of opinion between the two
brothers remained in Henry's possession. He had his own idea of the
use to which he might put the false teeth as a means of inquiry when he
and his fellow-travellers returned to England.

The only surviving depositary of the domestic history of the family in
past years, was Agnes Lockwood's old nurse. Henry took his first
opportunity of trying to revive her personal recollections of the
deceased Lord Montbarry. But the nurse had never forgiven the great
man of the family for his desertion of Agnes; she flatly refused to
consult her memory. 'Even the bare sight of my lord, when I last saw
him in London,' said the old woman, 'made my finger-nails itch to set
their mark on his face. I was