picture, then?"

"Yes; your description answers for my father when he was a young man. I
have not the slightest doubt that it was the one I seek who rendered you
this service. And she a Sister of Charity! I don't understand."

"Your story has interested me deeply, doctor. You have my most sincere
wishes for success; and if I can in any way assist you, don't hesitate
to call upon me."

"I believe you mean every word of it, and from my heart I thank you. I
must leave you now, to seek the house in the Strada Mezzodi--the house
that may reveal much or little."

At this moment the others enter; fortune has been kind to allow the
conversation to reach its legitimate end, and John, with a pleasant word
for Aunt Gwen and her husband, and only a peculiar look for the Briton,
hurries out.

In five minutes more he comes down stairs, ready for the street. To his
surprise he is stopped near the door by some one he knows--Philander
Sharpe, wearing a ridiculous helmet hat, as becomes a traveler.

"Pardon me, but I'm in a hurry," he says, as the other plucks his
sleeve.

"Oh! yes; but I'm going with you, Chicago," pipes the little professor,
shutting one eye and nodding in a very knowing manner.

"But I'm not off to paint the town red," says John, believing the other
thinks it is his intention to see the sights of Malta's capital by
night--"I have an engagement."

"In the Strada Mezzodi; eh?"

"Thunder; how did you guess it?" ejaculates the man of medicine,
astonished beyond measure.

"I am not a guesser. I know what I know, and a dused sight more than
some people think, especially my beloved wife, Gwendolin."

"What do you know--come to the point?"

"First, all about your past, and the trouble in the Craig family."

"Confusion! and you never told me you had ever heard of me before? This
explains the manner in which you seemed to study me at times on the
steamer," reproachfully.

"Just so. I had reasons for my silence; _she_ was one of them," jerking
his thumb over his shoulder in the direction of the parlor above, whence
the voice of the amiable Gwendolin Makepeace floats to their ears.

"In haste, then, let me tell you a secret, John. I was not always what
you see me, a docile, hen-pecked man. Twenty-five years ago Philander
Sharpe, young, good-looking, conceited, and rich, had the world before
him."

"Cut it short, I beg, professor," groans John, impatient to be off.

"I fell in love; my affection was returne