he had some secret commission to
entrust to us. The letter addressed to me apparently fell into someone
else's hands--probably one of the secret agents of Baron Oberg, who were
always watching Leithcourt's doings, and he, anxious to learn what was
intended, made himself up to look like me, and kept the appointment in
my place. Armida, having received the letter unknown to me, went up to
Scotland, and was also there at the appointed time. What actually
transpired can only be surmised, yet it seems that Leithcourt was in the
habit of going up to that spot and loitering there in the evening in
order to meet Chater in secret, as the latter was in hiding in a small
hotel in Dumfries. Therefore those who formed the plot must have
endeavored to throw suspicion upon Leithcourt. It is plain, however, as
both myself and Armida knew the gang, it was to their interest to get
rid of us, because the suspicions of the police had at last become
aroused. Poor Armida was therefore deliberately enticed there to her
death, while the inquisitive man whom the assassin took to be myself was
also struck down."

"By whom?"

"Not by Chater, for he was in London on that night."

"Then by Woodroffe?" Durnford said.

"Without a doubt. It was all most cleverly thought out. It was to his
advantage alone to close our lips, because in that same fatal chair in
Lambeth old Jacob Moser, the Jew bullion-broker of Hatton Garden, met
his death--a most dastardly crime, with which none of his friends were
associated, and of which we alone held knowledge. He therefore wrote to
us as though from Leithcourt, calling us up to Rannoch, in order to
strike the blows in the darkness," he added in his peculiar Italian
manner. "Besides, he feared we would tell the signore the truth."

"You have not told the police?"

"I dare not, signore. Surely the less the police know about this matter
the better, otherwise the Signorina Leithcourt must suffer for her
father's avarice and evil-doing."

"Yes," cried Jack anxiously. "That's right, Olinto. The police must know
nothing. The reprisals we must make ourselves. But who was it who shot
me in Suffolk Street?"

"The same man, Martin Woodroffe."

"Then the assassin is back from Russia?"

"He followed closely behind the Signor Commendatore. Markoff, a clever
secret agent of Baron Oberg's, came with him."

Then for the first time I recollected that the man I had recognized in
the Strand was a fellow I had seen loungin