m sure you would rather not sing to-night," she said kindly.

"Indeed, Countess, why should you think that?" retorted Louisa
lightly. "I shall be delighted to sing. I wonder which of these new
songs you would like best. There is an exquisite one by Guy
d'Hardelot. Shall I sing that?"

And Her Excellency, who so charmingly represented Denmark in English
society, followed her guest into the reception room: she admired the
elegant carriage of the English girl, the slender figure, the soft
abundant hair.

And Her Excellency sighed and murmured to herself:

"They are stiff, these English! and oh! they have no feeling, no
sentiment!"

And a few moments later when Louisa Harris's really fine voice, firm
and clear, echoed in the wide reception room, Her Excellency
reiterated her impressions:

"These English have no heart! She sings and her lover is suspected of
murder! Bah! they have no heart!"

CHAPTER XIV

THE TALE HAD TO BE TOLD

And whilst the morning papers were unfolded by millions of English men
and women, and the details of the mysterious crime discussed over eggs
and bacon and buttered toast, Philip de Mountford, the newly found
heir presumptive to the Earldom of Radclyffe, was lying in the gloomy
mortuary chamber of a London police court, whither he had been
conveyed in the same cab whose four narrow walls jealously guarded the
secret of the tragedy which had been enacted within their precincts.

Lord Radclyffe had been aroused at ten o'clock the previous night by
representatives of the police, who came to break the news to him. It
was not late, and the old man was not yet in bed. He had opened the
front door of his house himself, his servants--he explained
curtly--were spending their evening more agreeably elsewhere.

The house--even to the police officers--appeared lonely and gloomy in
the extreme, and the figure of the old man, who should have been
surrounded by every luxury that rank and wealth can give, looked
singularly pathetic as he stood in his own door-way, evidently
unprotected and uncared for, and suspiciously demanding what his late
visitors' business might be.

Very reluctantly on hearing the latter's status he consented to admit
them. He did not at first appear to suspect that anything wrong might
have happened, or that anything untoward could occasion this nocturnal
visit: in fact, he seemed unconscious of the lateness of the hour.

He walked straight into the library, where he