think?

"This cannot go on, Phrida!" I cried at last in desperation. "I will
search out this man. I'll grip him by the throat and force the truth from
him," I declared, setting my teeth hard. "I love you, and I will not
stand by and see you suffer like this!"

"Ah, no!" she implored, suddenly approaching me, flinging herself upon
her knees and gripping my hands. "No, I beg of you not to do that!" she
cried hoarsely.

"But why?" I demanded. "Surely you can tell me the reason of your fear!"
I went on--"the man is a rank impostor. That has been proved already by
the police."

"Do you know that?" she asked, in an instant grave. "Are you quite
certain of that? Remember, you have all along believed him to be the real
Sir Digby."

"What is your belief, Phrida?" I asked her very earnestly.

She drew a long breath and hesitated.

"Truth to tell, dear, I don't know what to think. Sometimes I believe he
must be the real person--and at other times I am filled with doubt."

"But now tell me," I urged, assisting her to rise to her feet and then
placing my arm about her neck, so that her pretty head fell upon my
shoulder. "Answer me truthfully this one question, for all depends upon
it. How is it that this man has secured such a hold upon you--how is it
that with you his word is law--that though he is a fugitive from justice
you refuse to say a single word against him or to give me one clue to
the solution of this mystery?"

Her face was blanched to the lips, she trembled in my embrace, drawing a
long breath.

"I--I'm sorry, dear--but I--I can't tell you. I--I dare not. Can't you
understand?" she asked with despair in her great, wide-open eyes. "_I
dare not!_"

CHAPTER XXIV.

OFFICIAL SECRECY.

The following evening was damp, grey, and dull, as I stood shivering at
the corner of the narrow Rue de l'Eveque and the broad Place de la Monnie
in Brussels. The lamps were lit, and around me everywhere was the bustle
of business.

I had crossed by the morning service by way of Ostend, and had arrived
again at the Grand only half an hour before.

The woman Petre had sent a letter to Digby Kemsley to the Poste Restante
in Brussels under the name of Bryant. If this were so, the fugitive must
be in the habit of calling for his letters, and it was the great black
facade of the chief post-office in Brussels that I was watching.

The business-day was just drawing to a close, the streets were thronged,
the traffic rattl