"Many thanks! Pity she is not of the same mind!"
"Girls change.—You never asked her but once. Suppose you try again. You are young enough and handsome enough to win whomsoever you please."
"You are complimentary. Suppose we leave all that and proceed to business. Tell me what you know of Miss Dane's abduction."
He seated himself before her and waited, his eyes fixed gravely on her face.
"To make what I have to say intelligible," said Miriam, "it is necessary to give you an insight into the mystery of her previous evanishment. She was tricked away by artifice, carried off and forcibly held a prisoner by a man whose masked face she never saw."
"Impossible! Mr. Walraven told me, told every one, she was with you."
"Very likely. Also, that I was dying or dead. The one part is as true as the other. Mollie never was near me. She was forcibly detained by this unknown man for a fortnight, then brought home. She told me the story, and also who she suspected that man to be."
"Who?"
Miriam looked at him curiously.
"Doctor Guy Oleander, or—you!"